EDITORIAL
Dear Member,
We are at the beginning of a new venture, so it is useful to remind ourselves of the reasons why our Association has been set up..:
To ensure the maintenance, protection and continuation of Corinne Mallet's collection (including archives and photographs).
This first newsletter will tell you about the work already carried out. In just two years, plenty of things have happened, and these have tangible results for everybody...
Think of Corinne's three fruitful journeys to Japan, and the crowning achievement represented by the relationship between the great master Yamamoto and his disciple, who came back soaking wet from her campsite on the slopes of Mount Fuji.
Think also of the publication of the two volumes of "Hydrangeas : Species and Cultivars", both of them abundantly illustrated and sold at a very affordable price. The English version was immediately put prominently on sale in the Royal Horticultural Society's shop at Wisley. We should recognize the hard work and
knowledge that went into them
At the last count, there were over 350 different taxa in the collection, but there are still many plants which need to be put into the inventory.
Corinne Mallet has given ample proof of her abilities, and we should work to encourage and help her. That is the purpose of our Association. So what should our goals be for 1995 and beyond?
To increase the number of hydrangea lovers in general, and of our members in particular, while continuing to work towards sharing the collection of plants and documents started by Corinne Mallet. This exchange of information and enthusiasm is, after all, the best way to encourage dialogue and to help each other to direct our energy in a positive direction.
HAPPY NEW YEAR !
Robert de Bosmelet, President
Our address :
Association de la collection
d'Hydrangea "Shamrock"
Route de l'Eglise
76119 Varengeville sur mer - FRANCE
The "Shamrock" collection of literature about hydrangeas
by Bryan Woy
This collection is kept at Corinne and Robert Mallet's house in Varenge-ville-sur-Mer, and is catalogued using a computer data base. Each document has its own entry in the data base, which at present contains 350 items, but which is constantly growing. The collection is based on the documents used in research for Volumes 1 and 2 of "Hydrangeas : species and cultivars". Most of these documents appear in the bibliographies of these two volumes, and the collection is divided into categories in a similar way to the bibliography in Volume 2,
Monographs : usually about
hydrangeas themselves, but sometimes biographies of major figures in the genus.
Florae.
Dictionaries : botanical and horticultural.
Miscellaneous : including general books on gardening, flower arranging, etc, where they contain relevant material.
Periodical articles : each article is treated as a separate document. Most of the 19th century and early 20th century material is in the form of photocopies, but sometimes consists only of a transcription of the relevant part of an article.
Plant lists : lists of the plants in botanical gardens and other plant collections.
Catalogues of the plants offered for sale by commercial nurseries.
An additional important category which does not appear in the bibliography is that of Letters : private correspondence between Corinne and Robert Mallet and hydrangea lovers and experts from all over the world.
Each entry in the data base is divided into fields as follows :
Code : each document is given a unique code to locate it in the collection.
Author's name or names.
Title : this contains the given title, and the volume and number for periodicals. Where the title of, for example, a magazine article, is not sufficiently informative, it may be "enriched" by adding words in brackets (names of species, cultivars, etc). Letters, of course, have no title as such, but the general content of the letter is indicated in this field. Where an item has come from another collection, this information is also given here.
Place of publication.
Publisher.
Year of publication.
Language : 59% of the material in the collection is in French, 30% in English, and the rest in German, Dutch/Flemish, Japanese and Italian.
ISBN (or ISSN in the case of periodicals).
Description : here the total number of pages is indicated in the case of a book ; also the presence of illustrations, bibliographies, etc.
Pages : this indicates the page numbers of periodical articles, and the relevant page numbers where only part of a larger document concerns hydrangeas.
Nature : whether the document is a monograph, article, etc. Also whether it is in the form of a photocopy or a transcription.
Subject : this indicates whether the general subject of the document is botanical, horticultural, decorative or biographical. There is additional space for the names of species, cultivars and people.
The Secretary/Librarian is always happy to answer enquiries to the best of his ability.
HISTORY OF THE "SHAMROCK" COLLECTION OF HYDRANGEAS
by Corinne Mallet
In 1983, I started working in the rare plants nursery of Robert, my future husband. When June and July came, I was able to watch the first hydrangeas flowering in the nursery. Often clients would ask for the plants in flower in the Parc des Moutiers, on the northern side of the house. These were H. macrophylla 'Mariesii Perfecta', otherwise known as H. m. 'Blue Wave'. At that time very few wholesale nurseries were selling plants with accurate names and very few were dealing with 'lacecap' type hydrangeas (which have flat headed inflorescences). That year 'Blue Wave' plants could not be obtained anywhere, and I found it difficult to have to disappoint my clients all the time. Finally it occured to me that perhaps I could propagate them myself by taking cuttings.
I started becoming interested in these plants which have such a long flowering period and such a variety of shapes. The following autumn when I met numerous suppliers I made sure to buy one plant of every hydrangea whose name was new to me in order to become acquainted with it. The next summer, I fell literally in love with hydrangeas. Not only were the plants I had bought flowering beautifully, with each flowerhead more beautiful than the next, but on top of that I had the great joy of being able to sell the young 'Blue Wave' plants I had propagated the year before and which had all grown successfully. Hydrangeas obviously liked me, for they had been good enough to let themselves be propagated by my own hand. I felt immensely grateful to them. I continued to propagate hydrangeas, and, above all, to buy new plants during the following years. . I was buying, without hesitation and whatever the price, any plant with a name or type new to me.
In 1989, my collection had become fairly large, and as we had to stop our nursery business and move away from where we were, I asked several friends to take some of my plants into their gardens.
My documents and knowledge had increased as fast as my collection. I became more and more distressed by the number of mistakes in the naming of species as well as cultivars. Confusion reigned, and it seemed impossible to impose any order on to the genus. Like all hydrangea fans, I dreamt of a book which would enable the plants found in private collections and professional catalogues to be accurately classified and named.
But the years were passing and no such work appeared on the market. The idea of writing this book myself gradually established itself and so, in 1990, as well as exploiting the documents I had already gathered, I began scanning European libraries for likely material.
In 1991, my husband and I rented an orchard behind our house and started to plant my collection. On the 31st July of the same year, I had the great pleasure of seeing my collection recognized as a 'Specialized Regional Collection' by the C.C.V.S. (Conservatoire des Collections Végétales Spécialisées), the French organization that lists and publicizes plant collections, and which is also linked to similar bodies on a worldwide level and to the public authorities.
In May 1992 the French edition of my first book "Hydrangeas, species and cultivars" was published. In June I went on my first journey to Japan, and came back filled with wonder, determined to get to know Japanese hydrangeas better ; wild plants as well as cultivated ones. While there I had visited a nursery which propagated hydrangeas and, above all, I had seen the incredible collection belonging to Mr Takeomi Yamamoto, the expert on Japanese hydrangea cultivars. On Mount Fuji and on the mountains of the Izu peninsula, I had been able to see wild specimens of H. petiolaris, H. paniculata, H. involucrata, H. hirta, and several different H. serrata.
In 1993 I applied for an open grant offered by "VSD-Nature" Magazine, and was lucky enough to win second prize. The project that was in my mind, and which this grant was to enable me to carry out, was to spend two months in Japan undertaking a thorough exploration.
I left at the beginning of July and was finally able to meet Mr Yamamoto. It was a joyful experience for both of us to find in each other somebody who was completely "smitten" with these plants.
I had then planned to carry out a systematic exploration of one of the faces of Mount Fuji, and it was also possible for me to explore parts of the Izu coastal strip where H. macrophylla plants grow in their native habitat. This expedition to Japan proved to be a rich source of personal contacts and of discoveries, and I was able to bring many cuttings back with me, as well as a large bundle of firsthand Japanese documents, including several monographs on the genus.
After I got back, the idea of opening the collection to the public began to present itself. Botanists and plantsmen from several countries had already come to visit, but it was obvious that a more formal organization would be required if visits were to become more frequent. In addition, my meagre savings had been swallowed up by my Japanese "adventures" and by the upkeep of the collection, and it was becoming necessary to look for an external means of support. Many articles about the book or the collection had appeared, and it seemed to Robert and me that the time had come to set up an association that would allow all our supporters to meet together in a common project.
At the beginning of 1994 Mr Takeomi Yamamoto wrote to tell me that he was to exhibit his hydrangeas for the last time at a special event held at a botanical garden in Tokyo and keenly encouraged me to come back to Japan for this occasion. The Association was set up in the spring, and thanks to support from the small circle of friends of which it then consisted, I was able to set off for Japan again in June.
After this fruitful ten-day journey (I had found more new documents and also revisited the Izu natural habitats) I was in a position to deal with Japanese hydrangea cultivars in my second book.
On the 1st July the collection was opened to visitors. The many guided visits that took place over the summer, and the astonishment shown by the public at the number and diversity of the different plants (there are now over 600), prove, if evidence is needed, how worthwhile it has been to open the collection to visitors. The large number of articles about the "Shamrock" Hydrangea Collection that have appeared during the past year in England, Italy, Germany, Belgium and Japan confirm me in my desire to make the collection even more complete and better known.
Species and cultivars introduced from Japan by Corinne Mallet since 1992.
H. hirta (reintroduction ex Mt Fuji)
H. involucrata 'Plenissima'
H. macrophylla 'Domotoi' (reintoduction)
H. macrophylla 'Frau Taiko' (horticultural cultivar)
H. macrophylla 'Hanabi'
H. macrophylla 'Hime-Gaku'
H. macrophylla 'Izu-no-Hana'
H. macrophylla 'Jogasaki'
H. macrophylla 'Mikanba'
H. macrophylla 'Miyakejima'
H. macrophylla 'Miyama-yae-Murasaki'
H. macrophylla 'Nadeshiko'
H. macrophylla 'Sumida-no-Hanabi'
H. macrophylla 'Thomas Hogg' (reintroduction)
H. paniculata 'Akazukin'
H. paniculata 'Daruma'
H. paniculata 'Hakusen'
H. paniculata 'Hime-Noriutsugi'
H. scandens 'Hanagasa'
H. scandens 'Handemari'
H. scandens 'Ishizuti'
H. scandens 'Tokara'
H. scandens gr. angustisepala
H. serrata 'Kiyosumi'
H. serrata 'Kurenai'
H. serrata 'Maiko' (reintoduction)
H. serrata 'Mikata-Yae'
H. serrata 'Niji'
H. serrata 'Seku'
H. serrata 'Shirotae'
H. serrata 'Yae-no-Amacha'
H. serrata yezoensis
H. serrata yezoensis 'Ezo-Nosei'
Plus about thirty wild H. macrophylla.
NEWS IN BRIEF
Visits to the collection : After the first summer (1994) of guided visits (200 visitors, by appoint-ment) of the collection, the same formula has been kept for 1995, but only from 15th July, when the main flowering season of Hydran-gea macrophylla and serrata. begins.
Kobe: we have been able to get in touch with our friends Masaaki and Kasuyo Ozaki (he is professor of French at Kobe University- she acted as our interpreter when we visited the Kobe Botanical Garden ) through the Association des Français au Japon. They have phoned to reassure us and tell us that they have come out of the disaster unscathed.
Slovenia: A video of the programmes made by Stane Sûsnic for Slovenian Television reached us at the end of January It contains two episodes, one about Jelena de Belder, and the other about the Shamrock.Collection
They are real historical documents.
Guardian : A double page article, elegantly written by Lee Wilson in the Weekend magazine of this famous British daily paper, described Corinne Mallet's adventures in Japan..
List of the plants that we are looking for to add to the Shamrock Collection.
Cultivars of Hydrangea macrophylla :
'Professeur D. Bois'
'Baby Bimbenet'
'Arthur Billard'
'Vulcain'
'Touraine'
'Jeanne d'Arc'
'Edith Binz'
'Charming'
'Princesse Béatrice'
'Sigyn Hartmann'
'Elbe'
'Schadendorf Perle'
'Edelweiss'
'Brunegg'
'Habsburg'
'Altenburg'
'H. J. Jones'
'Abendrot'
'Dr Bernhard Steiniger
'Hera
'Steina 104'
'Swester Alba'
'Tindorissa'
'Lenzburg'
'Wildegg'
'Kasteler'
'Ostergruss'
'Hallwyl'
'Biberstein'
'Wildenstein'
'Brestenberg'
'Burg Rosenberg'
'Bellikon'
'Burg Königstein'
'Thierstein'
'Heidegg' etc....
If you discover one of these plants, please contact your society at the address given on page 1. Happy plant hunting !!!