Tree shaping (also known as Pooktre, arborsculpture, tree training, and by several other alternative names) is the practice of training living trees and other woody plants into artistic shapes and useful structures. There are a few different methods of achieving a shaped tree, which share a common heritage with other artistic horticultural and agricultural practices, such as pleaching, bonsai, espalier, and topiary, and employing some similar techniques. Most artists use grafting to deliberately induce the inosculation of living trunks, branches, and roots, into artistic designs or functional structures.
Tree shaping has been practiced for at least several hundred years, as demonstrated by the living root bridges built and maintained by the Khasi people of India. Early 20th century practitioners and artisans included banker John Krubsack, Axel Erlandson with his famous circus trees, and landscape engineer Arthur Wiechula. Contemporary designers include "Pooktre" artists Peter Cook and Becky Northey, "arborsculpture" artist Richard Reames, and furniture designer Dr Chris Cattle, who grows "grownup furniture".
Read more about Tree Shaping: History, Methods, Common Techniques, Structure, Design Options, Related Practices, Plantings For The Future, Alternative Names, In Fiction and Art
Other articles related to "tree shaping, tree, trees, shaping":
... crossed, representing nature, sits on a tree stump with a fire burning in its base, conversing with an alchemist in an ankle-length coat, standing outside of his stone-laid shoreline laboratory ... the residents dwelled in living groves of trees, whose growth they had planned and directed from a very young stage into living quarters and sanctuaries ... In it, he wrote about the wisdom of planting trees in a circle, because once grown together, the ring of trees would be a much better house than could be ...
... Chairs, ladders and other shapes made from living trees are some examples of tree shaping ... Some types of tree shaping involve horticultural practices such as weaving, grafting, training, and/or shaping young, living trees into desired shapes ...
Famous quotes containing the words shaping and/or tree:
“Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet
Are of imagination all compact.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“It never had been inside the room,
And only one of the two
Was afraid in an oft-repeated dream
Of what the tree might do.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)