It only happens once every three years. The Major flower show by the Garden Club of Honolulu at the Art Academy AKA HOMA.
My sister Mimi and I decided to go bright and early on the first day, Friday May 8, 2026, while flowers and volunteers were fresher.
I planned a special symbolic lei to make. I watched over my flowers and trees for the special day.
The night before I started gathering, cleaning, hydrating, and prepping.
To begin, we moved my car and got out the ladder to pick early blooming Plumeria variety ‘Paterson’s Gold.’ Caroline Peterson for many years did the Giant florals at the Art Academy.
In fact, she interviewed May Moir for the Volunteer job. May said she was formidable. (May was too!) Moir and her Volunteer team created the large florals every week for more than 30 years.
It is a gorgeous and lovely fragrant plant. The buds are orange when they first emerge and the petals are golden yellow, some of them have pink tips.
May’s Granddaughter Susanne Zola gave me a cutting of this Plumeria, and we planted it by our front wall.
Plumeria ‘Petersons gold’ is a strong lei flower and a garden gift.
We had Plumeria ‘King Kalakaua’ in our Makiki garden growing up. It was a favorite of our Mom, Marilyn Bornhorst. When we moved to Wahiawa, and then Palolo, we planted cuttings in our new gardens.
This Flower is a later bloomer. I only had a few, but I wanted them to be part of these special lei.
I then went to the back yard where the ‘Happy Honeymoon’ Pua keni keni tree grows.
Dede Replinger insisted that we have this tree in our garden. It came from her special Aunty in Palolo.
I sprayed down the tree (Rinses off thrips and hydrates the flowers). I then picked young and old flowers and a few buds.
The finishing touch was Selaginella or peacock ferns for the green lacy ferny accent.
I prepared all the pua in the sink with basins of water.
Rinse the flowers and hydrate. Then cut the pua floral stems at an angle.
I then got out the PFAS dental floss. Some brands are not good for using in our mouths, as they employ forever chemicals. We went thought the list and marked them “lei making only”
I strung up two lei, one for me and one for Tita Mimi. I then got plastic bags, filled them with air, and floated on top of cool water.
(Never refrigerate a pua keni keni lei! It will go black and rot in the fridge)
We happily wore these floral creations of wearable color and fragrance to the Flower show.
Many inspiring plants, florals, and floral art creations!
Such garden gifts all around for our community!
In my “retirement” / creative employment, I just love creating Lei. And Sharing with Ohana and friends!
Ren MacDonald-Balasia of RENKO did a Floral demo with the GCH on Wed March 13, 2024.
She likes to use wild, weird and foraged florals, and rare, strange fruit from gardens or Chinatown.
RENKO Floral dragon
This was such an inspiration! We can all gather florals and foliage from our own gardens, from friends and even from wild weeds. Weeds can be beautiful.
We don’t have to import florals. Imported materials have a Carbon footprint big time. They also can be the source of harmful alien pests and diseases.
Many imported florals (e.g. roses without perfume) can last a long time, yet they are substantially dosed with chemical poisons insecticides and fungicides. Since they are not a food crop, they are not heavily regulated.
Some countries which grow imported florals don’t have the chemical safety regulations that we do, and this poisons the growers and us the consumers.
Read the Book Floral Confidential, if you really want to be informed (and Scared!) by this overuse of toxic chemicals.
And as we say: Buy Local! Or even better, Forage Locally. Glean from Local gardens.
The Floral event was at the Halekulani, and I invited my siter Mimi Bornhorst Gaddis.
As we were getting ready to go, my honey Clark Leavitt said, ‘set me up with a lei needle?’
He had gone on the roof and foraged for pua keni keni. So romantic. Our anniversary was the day before and he took his nephew Mark to lunch at Kailua Nico’s.
Mimi and I used the valet service at the Halekulani and walked through the flower filled lobby.
Two women were sitting in an alcove stringing Blue jade lei. “Wow kewl Blue jade!’ I remarked as we walked by (it turned out that these women were our speaker and her helper!)
We went to check in at the Garden Club desk, and as there was no usual flowers on second floor lobby, we walked around.
There was a woman sitting on a bench. Mimi and I introduced out selves and I gave her a tiare li`I li`i.
Her name was Pam and turns out she’s Ren’s mother, just home to care for her 97-year-oldmother who was a journalist for the star Bulletin.
The first AJA writer in Hawaii!
Soon the floral fun begins.
The first arrangement is in a wide tall bowl. She puts in what she called sea tamarind. We were in back and it was hard to see but I’m thinking that doesn’t look like tamarind. I kept trying to figure out what the orange bouncy floral might be. (Turnsout Harpulia, a common street tree in the Lychee family, Sapindaceae.
sterculia Mexican creeper lei Ohai Ali`i Harpulia AKA sea tamarind
She anchors the branches into folded up chicken wire set in the bowl. (Oasis is environmentally out. Mimi and I both have some stashed, just in case)
She then added Sterculia, Skunk tree pods, these are heavy and help to weight the other materials down.
Ixora is added. We got these at a gas station, Ren remarks.
Mexican creeper, which used to grow in our Makiki garden is draped all around. She calls it coral vine.
Bombax or shaving brush tree flowers like big puffs of pink added to the flora mix, next the lei she bought at Cindy’s Lei in Chinatown are added, ohai alii and a golden hala. She cuts and drapes and winds them into the arrangement.
Blue jade lei were added and draped over the arrangement. Such a lovely seasonal Spring beauty from Hawaii gardens!
blue jade and tita Mimi
She scouted for wonderful and strange fruit in Chinatown markets:
Fruiting Clusters of Longan, rambutan and Salak palm. Mimi said that they call it SALAT in SE Asia and it’s really ono. Pretty and scaly in an arrangement.
She had some nice blooming orchid plants that she bought from Kawamoto orchids in Palolo Valley. We kind of gasped when she cut the floral stems and put them in the arrangement. (they would last for a month or more on the plant). But this is what florists do for that wonderful Ephemeral special occasion.
CONSERVATION: instead of imported, chemically laden treated florals these were gathered in gardens in wild places and in local lei shops.
Such a good message we can get so much from our own Hawaii GARDENS!
My friend Lexi Hada contacted me about a volunteer opportunity. When Lexi calls you know it’s going to be a FUN and interesting time!
We joined some fellow volunteers, including some famous Lei makers at 9:00 a.m. at Linekona.
Lexi and Kaylee
I was so impressed with the Volunteers and staff joining with the Artist Rebecca Loise Law and her bouncy fun entertaining husband Andy.
Just being in Linekona is a gift and it brings back memories of other art projects, Classes in Art, wood shows, teaching and learning moments with art and our Honolulu Community.
Rebecca and Andy had asked for flowers which they would dry (in an upstairs room with newspapers spreadout on the floor)
We had brought big bags of floral gifts, tasty treats, and lei that we made to share from our gardens.
The Laws and HoMA worked with the Honolulu Botanical Gardens for a collection of great florals from Foster and Koko Crater Botanical gardens, including Quipo, which is a huge, stout trunked tree from South America, and is related to the African Baobab. The big, winged seeds of the Quipo which we’ve used as intriguing decorations over the years were strung into giant lei for the Awakening art show.
Cup and saucer plant on copper wire for exciting art show Awakening
We were given various dried flowers to work with:
Phalaenopsis orchids
RAINBOW SHOWER flowers
Cup and saucer
Cook pine needles
Sandpaper vine
Strands of super fine copper wire is used for stringing. We would carefully poke through the flower, like using a lei needle, or wrap the plant material with the fine wire. We spaced out the flowers by making an artful twist in the wire.
Sandpaper Vine
It sounds tedious but the time passed quickly, it was fun to learn a new style, which I likened to Lei making. Andy Law (husband of the artist) came bouncing into the room, and talked to us about the process, Life and gardens in England, Wales, and Scotland.
Three hours sounded like a long time to volunteer but Andy kept us entertained and the process was fascinating. I was so busy crafting and learning, visiting with the other volunteers and seeing their workmanship, that time flew by.
I congratulate the Honolulu Museum of Art staff for nurturing us volunteers; from free parking, snacks, and working together on such an engaging Floral Art project. There were several staffers to greet and orient us volunteers and Volunteer coordinator Kaylee Clark stayed with us in our lei making session, encouraging us, and sharing about art exhibits and other events at the Museum.
Clark stayed with us in our lei making session, encouraging us, and sharing about art exhibits and other events at the Museum.
Awakening is a year long exhibit in the upstairs L-wing. The Laws have produced these kinds of floral exhibits and art work previously but this is the first time in Hawaii. They brought dried materials and continued the process of gathering and drying flowers from Hawaii.
The main volunteer tasks for this project were cutting and bending of wire along with stinging of flowers. Flower donations came from volunteers. Flowers used each day varied on availability. The process was collecting, drying, and then a 3-day freeze. HoMA tried to keep each day different, as there were a lot of repeat volunteers and they wanted to keep the experience new and interesting. Approximately 250 Volunteers helped from August 16- September 16, 2022.
Andy and Rebecca arrived in Hawaii in early August 2022 and will stay and coordinate the assembly and opening of the art exhibit, which will be up for a year to enjoy.
They have had similar floral exhibits all over the world, including England.
Artful friends Marin Philipson, Debbie Choo, and Patty Mowat joined Lexi and me.
Amazing long time and Awesome lei makers Joyce Spoehr a HBG Retiree and active volunteer, Iris Fukunaga who still works at HBG (Honolulu Botanic gardens) and Dyanne Taylor a Master lei maker, famous for her tiare bud lei, is another City Parks and Recreation retiree(and fellow surfer) who Volunteers at all the fun plant and lei events. My Friend and great gardener Rosemary was there too. It was so fun to have the master craftswomen there, as we all learned this new technique.
I had so much fun making my lei, first with Phaleonopsis or Butterfly Orchids, then one with red cup and saucer and then with the Lavender cup and saucer. I had never noticed before, working with this as a fresh floral, the different shapes of the dried petals.
Loved the garlic vine flowers for a strand too. This is an old fashioned kama`aina plant that we do not see too often these days. I love the striking lavender color when it is fresh, and it dries very nicely. Seems like the petals are tough enough to hold up
As we completed each long strand (sixty inches measured by the length of our worktables), the lei strands were gently laid into big, long floral boxes, with the layers separated by tissue paper.
The process, of drying the flowers first was something like how botanists and taxonomists, like at the Bishop Museum or National Tropical Botanical Gardens, or even Kew Gardens in the U.K. make dried Herbarium specimens of plants to document and study.
Such a process and so many Na lima Kokua (helping hands) putting the art exhibit together.
As we were wrapping up, the artist herself joined us and we bedecked her with lei and floral gifts. Slender and dressed in black, Rebecca Louise Law looked amazing and happy with our floral adornments. She spoke a few quiet words thanking us.
Rebecca Louise and Andy Law
I thought about what a wonderful team she and her husband Andy make, him warm and bouncy and super enthusiastic, and she reserved and artistic.
Another amazing thing that happened was that the Director of the museum, Halona Norton-Westbrook, joined us to say mahalo, and spoke briefly with us volunteers.
I was talking with my neighbors on their sunset stroll and found that Julia Weiting was also volunteering. Every time she went, they gave her different florals to work with.
I was so inspired after about what I could make next! I also thought a lot about the process and which other flowers or foliage we might incorporate. A fresh style of lei making! A quick and fun one to teach keiki, a way to decorate homes or papale!
I am so excited to see the completed exhibit, called “Awakening.” Its opens to the public on Saturday September 17, 2022, and continues to be on display until September 2023.
The fragrance of tuberose! One of my Mother’s favorites, as a lei of tuberose and yellow roses are what my dad got her for their simple wedding ceremony. She also loved the smell of pineapple, because my dad gifted her with those too!
I like them in a lei, combined with other flowers like roses, carnations or orchids.
Florists carry this fragrant lei and if you grow your own, imagine what flowers from your garden you can combine with tuberose?
It’s an old-fashioned flower.
We used to grow a lot of them here in Hawaii. When I worked at Evergreen nurseries in Waimanalo, in 1978, one of my friends there, was working a second job, harvesting tuberose.
Her name was Estralita, and she was from the PI and recently married. I think her new family really made her work hard! At two jobs and at home. She said they harvested in the dark using headlamps.
She told me that her named meant “star” and how appropriate that she worked at night when the stars came out!
She taught me the saying ‘Mabuhay las Philippinas !!’ Long life to Filipino women!
I wonder what happened to her, as she was kind, nice FUN and hardworking.
Tuberoses remind me of her, and I say a special prayer for her happiness.
I got some from Estralita back then and grew it in our family garden in Makiki. It did well for a while and even sent up a flower spike. But then it got a very bad infestation of mealy bugs. I treated it but they were too severe, and the plant died. I was sad.
Maybe tuberose does not like Makiki black sand as a potting media? Or it needs cooler conditions. Time to do some research and find out!
The other day I got an email from my friend Ruth Fujita, another great gardener.
She was offering us, her Budleys, tuberose bulbs. She had a big plant and dug it up, dried out the bulbs a bit and had some to share with da girls.
So, Rachel Morton and I went up there, after a visit to Foster garden to see the Triennial art exhibit.
Ruth shared how she got the tuberose bulbs:
Our niece Tia C. had gone traveling. She needed omiyage for her epic Aunt Ruth and so in the airport she bought a bulb in a package.
Ruth grew them and was now sharing them with Lynne, Cheryl, Doris Susan Young, Annie, and me and Rachel.
Such an epitome of the Friendship Garden: Grow something with love (and good horticulture!) and then share it with your friends.
With rare plants, this is a Botanic Gardenconcept: Share it and keep good records. If yours dies, you know right where you can get a replacement.
With plants of sentiment like this tuberose, its mainly sharing the wealth and the stories. But it will be epic for us all to see them grow and Bloom!
People call it a bulb but the roots are actually a rhizome (just like our fragrant gingers)
Fragrant, showy flowers in the late, HOT summertime lead many to plant tuberose bulbs. The scientific name is Polianthes tuberosa, and it also called the Polyanthus lily. It is in the Lily family, LILIACEAE.
Florists and nurseries sometimes “force” tuberose to bloom year round with artificial lighting.
Tuberose has a strong and enticing fragrance makes it a popular plant in our Hawaii gardens. Clusters of large white blooms form on stalks that can reach 4 feet (1 m.) in height and rise from grass-like clumps.
Tuberose was discovered by explorers in Mexico as early as the 1500’s. It was one of the first flowers to be imported to Europe, where it was very popular in Spain.
It likes well drained, compost enriched soil. It likes FULL SUN especially hot afternoon sun (which not all plants do)
Plant them 2-3” deep.
In cold regions they dig out the roots in winter. In Hawaii we can dig them out hand let them rest but not for too long or they will dry out.
There are single and double flowered varieties and now we are seeing them in different colors like yellow and pale pink.
For many,
many years I have been a Lei Day Volunteer at the Mayor’s Celebration at
Kapi`olani park. It is such an amazing
event and I’ve learned and seen so much every year. Since 1984 in fact ! Yikes
I was first
asked to kokua with plant ID when I was working right across the street at the
Honolulu Zoo as Zoo Horticulturist. I
was reluctant to leave work, even for a few hours, as some of my landscape crew were on the
kolohe side.
Kupuna
Beatrice Krauss, our famed Ethnobotanist, was a fellow lei plant identifier and
any time with her was a precious learning experience. As she got older, she would ask me to drive
her, and again, more time with someone so akamai and kind, a Hawaii woman
Scientist, ahead of her time.
I told
myself when Aunty Bea is pau I will be pau too.
But over the years I have realized what a gift it is to volunteer with
this job. We get to see all the contest
lei as they are delivered at 7 a.m. So
amazing, creative and so much time and energy to grow, select, clean and prep
and then craft the lei. Timing is vital
for freshness and for flowers, like ilima buds to be open.
One year
there was a City-wide strike and we had to move the contest at the Hilton
Hawaiian Village, they also roped me into being a judge. Never again!
To me , all of them are winners.
Identifying the flowers, ferns, nuts and lei fibers is challenging but
way easier for me!
This year there were some stunners, plants with mixed silvery patterns, in the Heliotrope family Boraginaceae. We had native Hawaiian Hinahina, the lei flower of Kaho`olawe, an endemic native Hawaiian plant; combined with Kipukai, an indigenous Hawaiian plant, and Beach Heliotrope Tree or Tahinu, which is an import, that looks and acts like a native coastal and xeric tree.
This twisty
silvery lei combo was so amazing! After
doing our volunteer ID job in the early
morning we sometimes get a chance to talk to the lei makers.
I was
talking to an inspiring and creative young lei maker, Mary Moriarty Jones. I asked her where she collected all those
lovely plants or if she grew them herself.
We talked about them all being in the Boraginaceae plant family.
One
characteristic to identify this family is that the flowers are arranged in a
helicoid cyme. It twists to open like
the fiddlehead of a fern, and the flowers bloom one by one along the curving
floral stalk.
They also tend to have silvery hairs on their leaves. These reflect light and give the silvery Hinahina color. As a xeric adaptation to thrive in dry salty climates the silvery leaf hairs reflect light and also trap moisture and conserve it for the plant as it respires.
This silvery beauty to our eyes is how the plants have thrived for the millennia in harsh dry salty environments.
To grow them
for the long term it’s good to understand where they came from and adapt your
garden methods accordingly. They need
well drained soil and full sun. They are
more difficult to grow in pots than in the ground as they really need to spread
their roots far and wide (not deep). They like daily watering to get
established and then less and less water as their roots spread and adapt.
As my old
boss and mentor Masa Yamauchi would say,
“Observe your plants closely and water only as needed”.
This is a
skill we can all learn and cultivate.
Just as we can learn to grow our own rare and wonderful lei plants.
Heidi Bornhorst 