It appears that the deep freeze is over after only two or three days. Our world is not exactly down to the business of winter — the highs this week hint more of early spring — but there is, at least, several inches of snow on the ground still. If we are lucky, the latter half of this month will see a return of the cold, and perhaps more snow with it.
Here at Red Willow, the true spirit of this season is found in the snow, and with it, the flowering of winter.
It’s fitting, given that this is in fact the true season of renewal and rebirth. I know the colonial world fixates on spring for that, but there would be no new growth without the restorative slumber of the cold months. As with our own bodies, that of Mother Earth uses these lengthened sleeping hours to recharge, to rebuild, to heal the damage of a year just ended and to birth another one, young and fragile, but resilient too.
Winter flowers are very different from those of the hot season. If anything, they are more regular and symmetrical than the ordinary petaled blossom: mandalas made of dendrites, hexagonal prisms to catch the light, microscopic, kaleidoscopic blooms of purest crystal whose form and shape can last for weeks or only seconds, unique and circular spokes that are at their most powerful in community with others of their clan.
Winter medicine, indeed.
Countless numbers of their kind are still accumulated on the ground here. A few still cling to branch or bough; more gather upon the peaks. and once in a great while, we are privileged to see them as they fall: individual, unique, perfect.
That rarest of occurrences is what produced today’s three featured images, on a day at December’s end two years ago. Wings had created some new work that needed photographing, but we were having difficulty capturing it properly in the artificial light of the studio. It was, however, a soft gray morning, the natural light outside perfect for such pursuits, and so we took the black velvet pads out to the table that holds his grinder. As we were finishing our work, a new snow began to fall — gentle flurries at first, but rapidly increasing in volume and density. And the three photos here today are what resulted: sharply defined images of individual snowflakes, tiny crystalline kaleidoscopes glowing purest white against the black velvet.
Each one the most perfect winter blossom.
In that regard, they evoke the substance and spirit of today’s featured work of wearable art, shown here from two differing angles. We begin with the top view, shown here in the same shimmering silvery-white as flowering snowflake counterparts, against the same rich black velvet visible above. From its description in the relevant section of the Bracelets Gallery here on the site:
Winter Blossom Cuff Bracelet
In the high country, the winter blossom survives the early snows. Wings coaxes it into existence for every season with this slender cuff, its petals wrought of sterling silver ingot. The slim, spare band is utterly plain save for faint rounding at the ends, just enough to make the edges silky smooth, and the surface is given a highly textured Florentine finish. The focal accent consists of a flower formed of a flat round backing, center stamen and eight surrounding petals all formed of ingot ball beads, each made entirely by hand. Beads and backing are given the same antiqued Florentine finish, rich in texture and shimmering glow, like snow in the waning winter light. Band is 6″ long by 5/16″ across; focal bezel is 7/8″ across; small ingot beads are 3/16″ across; center ingot bead is 5/16″ across (dimensions approximate). Side view shown below.
Sterling silver
$1,025 + shipping, handling, and insurance
It’s true that this piece does not conform to the hexagonal structure of the truest winter blossoms, but it shares their style and animating spirit. Here, each petal is a perfect sphere instead of a dendritic spoke, and there are eight instead of six, arranged perfectly around a larger central orb, all atop a single hoop, a circle, a flat plane with a round, plate-like edge. But collectively they share in the snow’s frost-like surface and icy shimmer, a product of the near-white Florentine finish Wings produced on all of its surfaces.
And that frost-like effect evokes the background of the other two photos in today’s tripartite series — shot so close that the black velvet fades to gray aid its individual fibers, while the flakes glow with a cold white fire.
It’s a fire whose glow links the centers of the flakes in the image above with the center of the cuff as shown below. From the side, the ingot and overlay work become clearly visible . . . and yet, the center reminds me of the corona around a winter moon, the icy glow that heralds the coming of another storm front.
And with the storm’s arrival — sometimes overnight, sometimes not until the following day — our winter world flowers again.
There seems precious little chance of that this week, despite the substantial presence of shelf clouds this morning, not all of which have dissipated entirely yet, even at midday. But the mercury remains higher than the norm for these first days of a new calendar year, and there is nothing in the forecast to indicate the birth of any new weather patterns that would hold frozen water instead of merely wind.
The frightening aspect of our current circumstances is the realization that this may be the only real snow we are granted this winter. We of course pray otherwise, and we hope for the best, but hard recent experience has taught us that we don’t even have a frame of reference for the worst yet, no comprehension of its scope or scale, even as we are living it in real time now.
Yes, it is true that this may be our only snow this year, our only chance to see the prismatic beauty of the flakes and feel their cold fire upon our skin. It is nowhere near enough . . . and yet, it may have to be.
For now, hope and prayer remain ascendant, along with the giant bands of lenticular clouds and occasional iridescent shimmer in the skies. This is the flowering of winter, and we have faith: in the work of renewal and rebirth; in the cold floral beauty of the snow; in our world’s blossoming again.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2022; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
