Anna Laurent

Anna Laurent
Parinari capensis, by Bart Wursten
In South Africa's coastal grasslands, to explore a forest is to walk along its canopy—indeed, it's the only way to observe an extraordinary group of so-called underground trees, where only the uppermost leaves and branches are visible. Tucked away and protected from so many environmental threats, they underground forests are considered all... Read More »
moss graffiti
In the last several years, artists have reclaimed moss as a medium, creating site-specific installations to reclaim public spaces, and creating a new sort of growing, living graffiti. Read More »
Dragon's Blood Tree
If you're the type of person to travel the world for its flora, grab your favorite Indian Ocean field guide and head to Socotra, a remote island that is home to the legendary dragon's blood tree. 

 

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Temple of Flora
The Temple of Flora is perhaps the most famous florilegium or book of flowers from the golden age of botanical illustration. It's a charming collection of deliberately idiosyncratic flower portraits that became the portrait of a nation. Read More »
Queen Anne's Lace
Queen Anne's Lace is a weed, but an undeniably beautiful one, whose botanic descendent is the domesticated carrot, and named for the royal lace-maker Queen Anne of Scotland.  Read More »
tumbleweed
Rambling over the desert steppe and into our romantic visions of the American West, the iconic tumbleweed is the Clint Eastwood of plants—an itinerant survivor that seems to thrive on solitude, parched land, and a mean wind.  Read More »
silvestre
Botanic motifs flourished in Victorian design, and typography was no exception. Ornate filigree details and calligraphic embellishments were often designed as stylized flowers, leaves, and even trees, around the alphabet characters. We look at the story behind several typefaces inspired by the natural world. Read More »
Garden Design
A tribute album for a botanist? Carl Linnaeus—a botanist who named pretty plants for his friends and ugly plants for his enemies—knew the power of a name, and he would certainly be pleased that this modern Swedish folk music album bears his.  Read More »
Bodhi Anuradhapura
The Bodhi Tree is a sacred fig under which Buddha found enlightenment, and the Sri Maha Bodhi tree in Sri Lanka, grown from a cutting of the Bodhi Tree, is considered the oldest tree planted by human hands and is more than 2,000 years old. These two botanically notable trees have a sacred and interesting history. Read More »
Garden Design
Kentucky is known as the Bluegrass State, for a grass that flowers blue and yet the grass in Kentucky is generally...green. Our Botanic Notable column this week takes a look at the plant that gave a whole genre of music its name. Read More »
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