Jardín Botánico

When we talk about design in Colombia, we have to include the design of Nature. Colombia is the second country after Brazil that has the most biodiversity.

Here are a couple of pictures of the botanical garden of Bogotá. It was badly flooded last year and has lost a lot of species, but still amazing. An incredible lung in the heart of the city…

Illuminations Virrey

It seems like a tradition for people to go and see the Christmas illuminations in Bogotá. People stay there, taking pictures, enjoying themselves. There are even buses that take you from one illumination to another in different parts of the city. Our flat is so close to the one in the Virrey that we can see it from our window. So, as part of my learning of photography, I made some pictures:

El árbol del fin del mundo

A couple of days ago, I made a post about the art exhibition “El fin del mundo”.
The artists planted a tree in front of the exhibition, which is in the park of the Virrey and they called it El árbol del fin del mundo. 4 days since the tree is planted and it is still there. Bogotá’s council didn’t do anything about it yet. That would be amazing if it could stay and get big…

I don’t see this happening in Victoria park…

Aloe Vera (sábila)

Aloe Vera is a plant that grows here and we all know it is used in beauty products, for its softener properties. My daughter Carmen had a very bad fall the other day. She fell down face first and you can imagine the harm.

So, we went to a market called el mercado de Paloquemao in Avenida 19 # 25-02 and bought this plant called here sábila.

Mario prepared the magic potion and we apply on her twice a day. Colombians adviced us to use it for cicatrisation, and it seems to work very well.

Christmas in Bogotá

Christmas in Bogotá. 2pm. Nobody.

We are located in the 15th, which is an incredibly busy street in normal condition. But today, nobody is here.

At least there is one day in the whole year where there is no noise at the point that we can listen to the piano playing in the neighbour’s.

Hibiscus tea

My partner Mario is doing a project of reforestation in the llanos: www.pachamamaforest.com.
He is going there something like once a month. Last time he came, he got me some hibiscus flowers (flor de Jamaica). They need to dry for a long time before they are ready for tea. You can see the good things about hibiscus tea in there.
We are hoping to sell this tea next year.

Happy Christmas!

El fin del mundo

Calle 88# 13a-35. Bogotá. Until the 22nd of December.

Just went to see an art exhibition in a house in refurbishment. The topic is: “the end of the world”. This exhibition was organised at the last minute but they managed to get the press and everything.

The soldier is Mario’s (my partner). I am pround!

Le livre de Mamie

Today, I wanted to start telling you about the work I am doing with my grand mother. She is 85 and she’s called Thérèse. She was a farmer in the region of Vendée (Western France) all her life.

One day, I went to eat at her place and just realised how good was her meal, and nobody could cook better than a grand mother like the one I was lucky to have.

So I have decided to create a book of recipes so I could share moments with her and I could also make a project where I could do some illustrations. My idea was also to emphasize that at her times, we could live only with the products of the garden and fields, especially during the second world war. Today, that’s something most of us are forgetting.

It has been a long time since we started and I was quite busy with life’s obligations to achieve the project and to work on it. However, now that I have a bit more time, I want to take advantage of doing this blog to put myself into the task something like one day a week. So, I can have something ready sooner than never.

Bought in Expoartesanias

This is what I bought in Expoartesanias. Those amazing table mats are all made by hand with an element of a tree. It takes a woman 2 weeks of full time work to do this pieces (6).

Photo together with plates with a typical Colombian design. Just need to make a browny table cloth to go with.

Poinsettia

This plant called Poinsettia is the Christmas holly of Central America. Everybody has one here in Bogotá, and me too! I don’t know what happen to them after Christmas though…