Colour Bliss #16 – chris ranseder designs

Ouch! I have pricked my finger not on a spindle, but on the spiny tip of a sepal. The dry, shrivelled flower obviously does not want to be cut off and shoved into a box. Bad luck, off with your head!

I bought a couple of artichoke thistles (Cynara cardunculus) sometime last summer and left them in a vase until now. The gradual change of colour and shape as they blossomed and slowly aged was quite interesting to observe. Inspired, I got a kick out of playing with scrap yarn.

Relatively fresh artichoke thistles and a palette of greens and purples wound with scrap yarn. — Artichoke thistles and a palette I am actually inclined to design a pattern for.

Tufts of hair are revealed in a gap between dry sepals| The white mane of a horse. — Ah, what lustrous locks you have! Tightly packed, the tufts of hair on each seed reminded me of a horse mane.

Peeling paint. | Close-up of dry sepals. — Moisturize!

Spiny sepals. | Spines of a hedgehog. — Cardoon versus hedgehog: who is the spiniest of them all?

Detail of a wrought iron window grille. | The dry stem of an artichoke thistle. — Graceful curves.

Petals of an artichoke thistle ladden with pollen. | A leather coral.

The rusty surface of an iron pillar. | Dry sepals of an artichoke thistle. — Proud to be still standing despite the ravages of time.