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This popular event was held on February 3-5, 2023 at the newly remodeled Mission Del Oro Hotel in beautiful downtown Santa Nella, California. Over 125 full registrants participated in workshops, lecture-demonstrations as well as many day pass walk in visitors.

On January 14-15, 2023, the Bay Area Bonsai Associates held their 41st bonsai exhibition at the Lake Merritt Garden Center in Oakland, California. Here are some of the highlights, starting with the Best Conifer award winner from the Pacific Bonsai Expo.

In last week’s post we left off in 2017 – about 10-15 years into the development of a black pine that was field-grown at Lone Pine Gardens in Sebastopol, California.

I’ve been waiting a long time to share the progress on one of my black pines, and now is a great time for it!

Over the past year, Andrew Robson and I spent a lot of time talking about small trees. The result is Shohin School, an effort to promote the understanding and appreciation of shohin bonsai.

Let’s wrap up our initial tour of the Expo with some examples of medium and shohin displays.

As promised, Joe Noga’s professional studio photographs.

If seeing great deciduous bonsai at the Pacific Bonsai Expo felt like a treat, seeing the conifers offered a different feeling. It felt like a great opportunity to catch up with trees, and species, that I don’t get to spend a lot of time with.

Back in March, when the submissions started coming in, Eric Schrader and I were thrilled by the quality of the deciduous bonsai.

Steve Zeisel, sponsor of the Winter Silhouette Bonsai Expo did it again, and visitors enjoyed an elegant display of bonsai! Every bonsai was of much better quality than in the first nine expos featuring naked trees. He holds the event to promote bonsai and allows exhibitors to express their beautiful bonsai and creative displays, especially in their winter appearance.