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Ipsophyto is born from
urgency, wonder and a desire to effect evolutionary action.
This endangered planet of ours hosts many life forms and
this site is one. Ipsophyto
is
dedicated to plants and our relationships with them; where
virtues are extolled, everyday life applications celebrated
and transformation embraced. From building materials to
breakfast cereals, flu cures to ceremonial psychedelics, we
owe our existence and culture to plants.
Plants have always
played a prominent part of my life… born and mostly
raised in a small village in Somerset I was never more than
a few metres from sprawling fields, the levels and its
rivers. Some plants-people may have heard of my grandfather
Thomas Hope Findlay MVO VMH who, along with Sir Eric
Savill, discovered the amenity horticulturalist
favourite Mahonia x
media. This plant
was
spotted
amongst a batch of Mahonia
lomariifolia seedlings raised in
a northern Ireland nursery in the fifties. Savill and Hope
selected six seedlings for the woodland Garden at Windsor.
One of the specimens was quite distinct for, when it
flowered, it showed intermediate characters between the two
parents. On receiving a Preliminary Certificate in 1957, it
was named Mahonia
'Charity', with
another cultivar named Hope after my Grandad.
Photographs
by Joanna Winterburn
Hope followed on in the footsteps of his father, my Great
grandfather, Robert Findlay who was ‘Keeper of the
gardens’ or curator, at RHS Wisley. I myself have
long been an admirer of the apple tree (Malus
species) ever since my
grandfather Hope introduced me to Woodpecker cider! From
awe-struck naïve young child to awe-struck naïve scientist,
my interest (what else is there to look at in the
countryside apart from cows, sheep and Yeovil Town FC) soon
sparkled into a love affair with plants…
As a species, it is clear human beings have almost reached
a point of no return; our current man-made climate extremes
reveal snapshots of a future with higher temperatures,
frequent droughts and failing crops with carbon emissions
continuing to rise. Similarly, perilous predictions follow
the continued current melting of polar ice-caps, revealing
rising sea levels that will flood the east of England. In
terms of ecological destruction; specifically rates of
habitat loss and overall decline of bio-diversity, we are
witnessing increasingly higher rates year on year. At
current consumption rates we will need a new planet by
2050.Time has almost run out. We are living in an age of
peak oil, and of one thing we can be sure; the age is
coming to a close, and we need creative solutions to a
range of problems as we draw the curtain down on
petro-chemical society. Fast.
This site aims to cast off and reject inhibitive science,
dispel unenlightened fears and lay open the wonders and
secrets of plants. Amongst the Manifestations here will be
up-to-date information for action to preserve our natural
environment in defence of Gaia, as well as a myriad of
random plant-based snippets. Ipsophyto
objectives are
simply to enable anyone and everyone to take back control
over their health, diet and life. Hopefully, information
here will be of assistance to the warriors who act on
behalf of fragile ecosystems, as well as folk who simply
wish to attain success with plants. But Ray Mears it is
not! If only…
So we will obligingly step aside of convention, and sell a
dummy to cultural prejudice and the mother of all
f**k-ups…assumption. An open mind will be required
for this journey to discover the secret life of plants,
where we are not wholly dependent on our five physical
senses and are prepared for more than bland high street
culture.