Playing Soldiers and Marking Time – Pembrey Seed Heads

We used to have games of “soldiers” with these Ribwort Plantains when we were young – trying in turn to knock the head off each others “soldier”. Perhaps decapitate would be a more accurate term!

And of course everyone tells the time by the Dandelion seed head – what other way is there to do it?

Plantain

Dandelion

Pembrey Pine

Flowers come in all shapes and sizes, colours and combinations – every plant has its own form. To my mind, the less flamboyant flowers of a pine are no less attractive than those with beautifully coloured petals.

Pembrey Pine

Pembrey Pine Flower

A Little Splash of Pink

It may be a common wild flower, but that doesn’t make it any less pretty – another photo from the Pembrey Country park “Floral Walk” in Carmarthenshire, Wales.

Pembrey Wild Flowers

Pembrey Wild Flowers

Rolling Out

Rolling out, unfurling, opening up – call it what you will. At the end of May these plants in Pembrey Country Park were getting ready for Summer.

Pembrey Unfurling

Pembrey Unfurling

Pembrey Floral Walk

In May 2013 I did a StillWalks production walk at Pembrey Country Park in Carmarthenshire, Wales. The production followed what Pembrey calls its Floral Walk.

The photos I am posting this week are from this StillWalks production which, as yet, has not been post-produced or published. I won’t bother going into the reasons for this but hope that you enjoy a Welsh woodland floral week on the blog.

Pembrey Catkins

Pembrey Catkins

Pembrey Catkins

Overside and Underside

The architecture of the main entertainment block in Park Tawe, Swansea, could not be said to be very inspiring. There is a covered walkway over to the centre of town which is purely functional in its design.

However, viewed from the right angles and in the right conditions, some great patterns can be seen. Even the peeling paint on the underside creates a kind of two tone map of some imaginary archipelago.

covered walkway

shadow pattern

walkway underside

Fractured Glass – Stars and Stripes

I guess, on this day you could call these photos stars and stripes (no offence intended) 😉

My recent walk around part of Swansea to look at some of the architecture and cranes revealed more patterns than those created by construction.

The details of this fractured glass, when seen close up, are fascinating. I was frustrated not to have taken a much closer macro shot when I looked at the images on my computer. The second image is a screen shot of the first image zoomed in to full size but is not one that would print well due to it being at screen resolution – click on that image to see it larger.

broken glass

broken glass detail

broken glass

Constructing and Constructed Architecture

I love the complex patterns created by the scaffolding on this construction site in Swansea. I have no idea what the new building will look like but it will be sitting beside the interesting patterns to be seen in the design of the BT tower across the road.

The BT tower is not a particularly attractive building – it looks a bit like something you would need to plug in for your phone. There are, however, many fascinating shapes, patterns, reflections to be seen in its surfaces and structure.

scaffolding patterns

scaffolding patterns

BT tower Swansea

BT tower Swansea