Pontil & Pistil / Specimens
Eight glass models, in the order the plants flower
Each plant sets its own start date. A hellebore waits for midwinter and a water lily for a warm June, so the cabinet fills in the order the flowers open, not the order we would choose. Numbers run in the order we took the commissions.
| No. | Plant | Family | Flowers | Scale | Bench weeks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0417 | Lilium, Asiatic hybrid | Liliaceae | June–July | 1 : 1 | 11 |
| 0391 | Paeonia lactiflora | Paeoniaceae | May–June | 1 : 1 | 16 |
| 0366 | Iris germanica | Iridaceae | May–June | 1 : 1 | 14 |
| 0352 | Magnolia grandiflora | Magnoliaceae | June–August | 1 : 1 | 19 |
| 0338 | Passiflora caerulea | Passifloraceae | July–September | 2 : 1 | 22 |
| 0320 | Nymphaea alba | Nymphaeaceae | June–August | 1 : 1 | 13 |
| 0301 | Papaver rhoeas | Papaveraceae | June–July | 2 : 1 | 9 |
| 0287 | Helleborus niger | Ranunculaceae | December–March | 2 : 1 | 10 |
What each plant asks of the glass
- 0417
Lilium
Six tepals, six stamens and one pistil on a three-chambered ovary. The counts never vary, which is why it was the first specimen.
- 0391
Paeonia lactiflora
Dozens of stamens ring a small cluster of separate carpels. The difficulty is volume: every stamen is its own piece of glass.
- 0366
Iris germanica
Three upright standards, three falling tepals called falls, and three petal-like style branches that hide the stamens underneath.
- 0352
Magnolia grandiflora
The tepals are not split into petals and sepals, and the carpels sit in a spiral on a cone. It is one of the oldest flower plans still flowering.
- 0338
Passiflora caerulea
Ten tepals, a fringe of corona filaments, five stamens and three styles on a stalk. Booked for 22 weeks because of the fringe alone.
- 0320
Nymphaea alba
The tepals grade into stamens with no clear line between them. Glass handles that gradation better than any drawing does.
- 0301
Papaver rhoeas
The two sepals drop as the bud opens, leaving four crumpled petals around a flat stigmatic disc. Modelled at twice life size.
- 0287
Helleborus niger
What looks like white petals are sepals. The true petals are small nectar-holding cups hidden in the centre. Modelled at twice life size.
Which plants make the best glass models?
Plants whose structure repays close looking. That means flowers with a clear, countable plan, such as lilies and irises, and flowers with a surprising one, such as the passion flower’s fringe of corona filaments. Flat or very small flowers gain little in glass, and the bloom must last at least a day to be scanned.
What does a scale of 2 : 1 mean?
It means the glass model is twice the size of the living flower. We use it for small flowers, such as poppies and hellebores, where the anatomy is too fine to read at life size. A model at 1 : 1 matches the flower exactly; both are recorded in the specimen’s reference sheet.
Can I suggest a plant that is not in the cabinet?
Yes. Send the species and the month it flowers where you are. We will tell you within two working days whether it suits glass, what the bench time would be, and which closer relative we could model instead if it does not. We decline plants whose blooms last under a day.
Commission a model
Tell us the plant and the month it flowers. A person answers, usually within two working days.