What's in the box?

Whenever a parcel turns up it is always fun, the un-wrapping and first view of the item.  Normally I am not too bothered by the wrapping but this one was different. What was in the box? Two more boxes:

It then started to rain, so a quick move inside to open the final layer. Only to find another two boxes, and I'm starting to get a feeling of deja-vu. This 5th box looks different, maybe this time:

Nope, another box. Have I got caught up in a game of pass the parcel. This one is must be the final one:

No more boxes, but more protection hiding the contents.

Finally the contents are revealed. That was some packing, 6 boxes is going above and beyond to ensure they get there in one piece.

So this set of pots came from the UK, a father and son team of potters called Erin Pottery.  They specialise in bonsai pots, and have a great set of pots on their website. It took me a while searching through to find ones that were a little deeper. I ended up with a few different forms to play with.

So going from the smallest to largest. One of my favourite miniature aloes, a. descoingsii var descoijngsii.

A very compact little plant and clumps up nice and quickly.  It has tiny pink flowers, which are on a massively long stem. I did try to photograph the whole thing, but had to get so far away you coudn't actually see the flowers. I can highly recomend this little plant to any aloe fan.

The next pot was perfect for one of the new agaves. A. albopilosa is a very recent discovery and up until this year has only really been available through seeds.

Mine were seed grown and this one is hopefully about to develop the tufts that made the categorisation as an agave controversial.  If you have not seen the photos of the adult plants, go and do a quick search they are lovely.  They are just starting to appear as plants for sale if you can't be bothered with seeds. The pot will give it plety of room to grow and should at least last it a couple of years.

The next pot is about the same size, but has a wavey edge which is lower on one side.  I think they are officially known as "freeform pots". It took a while to decide on what to plant it up with; a clumping plant that will flow over the edge or something more bonsai like. In the end it was one of my dudleyas, I think it is D. farinosa but the id has never been certain.

The plant is quite slow to get into growth after winter, so the jury is out as to whether this will work or not, it may be a little heavy for the pot. What do you think?

Finally the largest pot. Originally the dudleya was going to go in this one, but then thought of my crassula buddha's temple.

The flower seems to keep going, I have got used to it now and it doesn't look as wierd.

I am hopeful that some of these plants are going to turn into even better features pots over the summer. I may even be tempted to show a few of them if they develop nicely. At least the pots are up to show standards.

So still not pots for the two plants that need it.  Maybe in the next set. BUt my collection of hand made pots is growing rapidly.