Evan Marsh workshops
Is was great to have Evan back in SA again and several workshop participants took advantage of this by bringing trees they’d worked on with Evan last year. The value of ensuring their trees were progressing according to previous direction can be vital to realising the original design concept.
Luke
Evan’s workshop was a great experience as he assisted me with my Chinese elm. The most valuable takeaway was his guidance with picking a front, placement of primary branches, and applying the tourniquet method to better position the leading branch.
I haven’t done a workshop like this before, and I liked how tailored the guidance was for my tree. Whilst you can learn a lot from bonsai presentations and videos, sometimes the information isn’t relevant to the tree you want to improve. The things you learn at the workshop also stay with you better, and make more sense because it’s applied to your own tree right in front of you.
I also liked the small group aspect of this workshop, it’s a good balance. It was very relaxed and had a great atmosphere.
This workshop probably put my Chinese elm years ahead compared to what it would have been otherwise.
Millie
I brought in a Callistemon to work on and Evan walked me through a few possible designs and future structures.
It wasn’t the right time for major pruning, but we did some wiring to set the branches ready for further work later this year – which will include a major chop and possibly a trunk/root ball reposition.
I also observed a further workshop, and I always find the way Evan describes how trees grow and adapt to the stresses we put on them to be very easy to understand. I thoroughly enjoyed listening to him explain the growth cycles of Japanese Black Pines, and took many notes as a result!
Watching Evan work is always enlightening, and I personally find his explanations easy to follow – I always learn so much from him either through participating or observing.
James
Evan is an amazing bonsai artist. I attended the workshop seeking assistance to style my Japanese black pine, and Evan provided insightful guidance to it’s further development. He helped set the primary and secondary branch structure in place. The tree will now go back onto the growing bench for further growth.
I thank Evan for his help as I can now see this tree’s future as an amazing black pine bonsai.
Des
Both Margaret and I really enjoyed Evan’s workshop as we would never have known where to start on our two trees given their size and our inexperience with Bonsai.
The Golden Ash required some radical pruning – something I was too timid to do as it is 40 years old and he showed me that it had a hidden shape which was only revealed by careful cutting back and wiring.
The same applied to the English Elm which Margaret was working on. It didn’t require such strong cutting back and didn’t need wiring but it needed a little re-shaping . He also gave us information on how and when to repot them, which was great advice.
All in all it was a great afternoon and very worth while, and we will approach the monthly workshops with more confidence in what we are doing .
