“Hina-matsuri”- Ikebana for Children

In Japan, Hina-matsuri (Girls’ Day/ Dolls’ Day) is celebrated on March 3rd with elaborate displays of Hina-Ningyou dolls on red-covered tiered platforms displayed in homes. As part of Hina-matsuri celebrations, my daughters love to eat hina-arare (puffed rice crackers), ichigo daifuku (いちご大福), and Sakura-mochi (桜餅).

The lure of traditional Hina-matsuri flowers, peach blossoms and canola (Rapeseed blossoms), was too much for my two enthusiastic ikebana daughters and thus it was inevitable that they would want to create Hina-matsuri ikebana arrangements.

Required materials

My daughters decided to make a joint arrangement. My eldest daughter decided to make a taller arrangement to symbolise the Emperor in the Hina-matsuri display, while my younger daughter made a smaller arrangement symbolising the Empress.

Carefully putting water in the vases.

Placing Prunus branches in the vases.

Here in Madrid, Almond and Plum blossoms are in full bloom, so we used Prunus from our garden, in lieu of Peach blossoms, and Rapeseed flowers, which grow like weeds along the bicycle path near our house. As pink and yellow flowers are traditional in Hinamatsuri arrangements, they also added pink Tulips and yellow Ranunculus to further enhance the feeling of spring in their arrangements.

Adding the first flowers.

Cutting the stems of Ranunculus in water before adding them to the arrangement.

Placing the last flower, extending beyond the edge of the vase.

When placing the arrangements together, we were conscious of the negative space between the vases and, in keeping with the theme of Hina-matsuri, they added the Emperor and Empress from our small set of Hina-Ningyou’s.

Adding our Hina-Ningyou to the arrangement.