Plants part 2: Sakura

Well, much to my pleasure the Kamizukuri plant kits came today, and I was overjoyed.

As mentioned in my last post I ordered 2 sets of cherry blossom, a set of generic leaves and a set of weeds.
Here are the weeds and tree leaves:

 They are on nice quality paper, with the weeds being semi-translucent.  The blue and black you are seeing are the backing cards to keep them flat.  They are just like etched metal, only laser-etched paper.

The Sakura is a step up from these.  The packaging is better and seems to be a special product.  I know that cherry blossom is important in Japan, I just never thought it would extend to model blossom.  It's a nice touch.

Like the others the petals and leaves come on a laser-etched sheet, and are very very well defined, as you can see.

Unlike the generic tree leaves here you get a tree!  Well, this:

It is a bunch of paper-coated thin wire with a wrapped base representing the trunk.  Following the instructions (which are all in Japanese, but illustrated) I twisted and manipulated the strands until I got this:

I should point out that this is the very first tree I have ever made!  So if I can do it I suspect that anyone can.
You snip the overlong branches off and, using small sections, bend into Vs and glue these on as additional branches.  I have done a few, but I don't want to overdo it.

Next time I will cover the twisted wire and start to paint it.  Good references of Japanese cherry trees will be invaluable in getting the colours right.

These are beautifully produced kits and certainly give a good scale appearance of a tree and foliage.

Mata atode.