By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer
Maybe it's because I took a week of vacation in mid-December this year which threw off my normal holiday routine. Or maybe it's the effect of the economy which is making us all gear back on everything. Or maybe it was deadlines. But for whatever reason I didn't entertain much this holiday season, and now I regret it.
So I think I'm going to throw a Chinese New Year's party in order to spend some time with friends before the year gets too crazy. 2009 is the Year of the Ox, and I think we're all going to need ox-like patience and strength to get through it. So I'm in the same mood as the lunar year.
I plan to wrap some vases in joss paper, make sake-tinis, supplement a few main courses with some Chinese take-out, and attempt this bouquet. It was made by Kit Wertz and Casey Schwartz, the sisters/owners of the Redondo Beach floral design studio, Flower Duet. They are offering a workshop on this Chinese New Year-inspired bouquet at Huntington Gardens on January 24, 10 am to noon. (The bouquet made there will not be identical but will have the same traditional elements.) $85 for non-members. Registration: 626-405-2128.
Everything in this bouquet is symbolic, Wertz told me. Red and gold are traditional Chinese New Year colors. Red drives away evil and bad luck and represents happiness. Gold represents wealth. Red and gold also stand in for two of the five elements of feng shui -- fire and metal, respectively. Water is a third element. And the remaining two are wood (represented by the stalks of lucky bamboo) and earth (represented by the glass marbles in the vase).
The numbers used are significant, too, says Wertz. Nine is always an auspicious number; it symbolizes good luck and long life. (Wertz used nine red roses). Five is also good as it is said to attract wealth and health. (There are five stems of lucky bamboo and also five shorter stalks of trachelium jade.) The green cascade spilling out to the table symbolizes the firecrackers the Chinese like to set off at midnight to scare away evil spirits. What they actually are, though, are snippets of horsetail (Equisetum).
Other flowers traditional for Chinese New Year--January 26th this year, by the way--are peach blossom, narcissus, sunflowers, and chrysanthemums. Kumquat fruit is often used, too.
