Earth at Work

I know I told you the other day that I’d visit the intriguing pavilion at the Serpentine Gallery in Hyde Park before it comes down and on Tuesday I set out to do just that but, as my former Sunday School teachers would say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

In this instance I became completely and utterly distracted by the rose garden close to Hyde Park Corner, which I have barely looked at all summer long.  What’s more, the light was  perfect and as I wandered from flower bed to flower bed with my camera, thoughts of the pavilion fell away.

First there were the roses.  I’m a terrible sucker for blousy ones like this – they’re right up there with Green and Black’s, a glass of dry white and a weepy rom-com. Ok, maybe not the rom-com but Colin Firth swimming in the lake at Pemberley, certainly.

Then there were Japanese anemones (A. hupehensis), which are on their way out now – yes, we’re that far into autumn. The flowers on these were pink but I far prefer the white and so have removed the colour from the pictures in order to have my way.

I am particularly fond of the shapes their stems and spent flower heads form. Aren’t they gorgeous? Quite unexpected, too. There’s a metaphor for life somewhere in that, I expect.  They are sometimes called windflowers, a name deriving from the Greek anemone – meaning wind, not flower, obviously.  The name is quite fitting.

On, then, to a regular daisy; there’s a tattiness in this one that’s rather appealing.

And a picture of one of the flower beds thrown in for good measure.

Now all that remains is to find that pavilion.