As you may have seen in other posts about Impose designs, this is an annual competition where we have 3 hours to complete a design not knowing what the subject will be or what staging and plant material will be provided. All competitors are in the same situation with the title being revealed 15 minutes before the start of the competition and materials provided about 10 minutes before we start. It is a design that can be completed by one or two people – I have always competed in this class on my own as I tend to be uncommunicative about my thought/design process when it is being developed. This is something you need to consider when contemplating designing with another person. I have some truly close friends who compete at the same time as me but we know that we are better working on our own rather than together.
Here you can see the staging provided and the plant materials. The brief for this competition was to showcase at least 70% of the materials provided. Remaining material had to be left on the workbench for stewards and judges to see.
Of the materials provided, I found the bamboo fencing the most challenging to incorporate into the design, finally using it as the “entrance carpet”.
I placed one of the plinths on its side and made a low wall for banksias to be threaded through, hoping to emulate spotlights along the walkway. The second plinth has a repeated cover of the bamboo with cascading lengths of hessian decorated with gum leaves coming from an explosive grouping of the plant material to signify the celebratory nature of the event.
Judges comments: Whilst the actual use of the plant material is appropriate, the placement of the matting draws the eye to the blank wall. If the matting had been angled in to a diminishing point it would have made much better use of the space for this design.
