Our 50th Anniversary Celebration

This year was a very important milestone in our Chapter’s history and we celebrated our Chapter’s 50th Anniversary and presented the Annual Ikebana Exhibition as a single event on Saturday, May 23, 2009 at the Embassy Suites Hotel in Bellevue, WA. The day long series of activities included the Annual Ikebana Exhibition, a special ikebana demonstration by the visiting Professor, Noriko Obata (Ikenobo Institute, Kyoto, Japan), and the 50th Anniversary Celebration Banquet.

Ikebana set-up time was between 8 am and 10 am in the Garden Atrium and Promenade area of the Hotel. 39 beautiful ikebana arrangements were created by the visiting Professor, Noriko Obata and our devoted Chapter members: Janice Becker, Kay Bill, Peggy Booth, Nobie Chan, Lily Chang, Charles Coghlan, Diane Elliott, Yoshi Erickson, Karen Esayian, Rosemary Frerk, Aiko Fujii, Mitsuko Hakomori, Carol Henderson, Shirley Hill, Mei Lan Huang, Aiko Ii, Michiko Jessett, Toshiko Kawata, Flora Lim, Mary Love, Gary McLaughlin, Lily McMahan, Barbara Montemayor, Karen Nagai, Yoshiko Nakamura, Clarice Nerseth, Nobuko Ohgi, Shigeko Price, Nobuko Relnick, Akemi Sagawa, Megumi Schacher, Elaine Stamm, Kriss Tanaka, Shizue Tanaka, Linda Vane, Sita Vashee, Ellen Widmayer, and Julia Yang. I wish to express my sincere appreciation to all the “ikebana artists” for their devotion and skills. It is because of your love of this art that we can continue our effort to bring “Friendship through Flowers” to the world.

The 50th Annual Ikebana Exhibition was officially opened at 10:30 a.m. with the Ribbon Cutting Ceremony officiated by the Consul–General of Japan, the Honorable Mitsunori Namba, the Consul Takashi Kuchii and Mrs. Hiroko Kuchii, Ms. Catherine Roche (Seattle Art Museum curator), visiting Professor, Noriko Obata, and our President, Shirley Hill.

The Exhibition was open to the public between 10 am and 4 pm and 148 visitors signed in our guestbook during the official exhibition hours. However, there were many others (including the hotel guests) who enjoyed the ikebana exhibition after 4 pm as the ikebana display remained until 9 pm. We received generous donations at the registration table from members and guests.

I would like to express a special “thank you” to Aiko Fujii for the beautiful Japanese Calligraphy, Karen Nagai for the name cards for all ikebana arrangers, and Nobuko Relnick for publicity.

I also would like to thank all the exhibition hostesses: Lily Chang, Diane Elliott, Rosemary Frerk, Lorna Holt, Toshiko Kawata, Kinue Kuwahara, Flora Lim, Nobuko Ohgi, Akemi Sagawa, Megumi Schacher, Kazumi Shimizu, Beata Stensager, and Shizue Tanaka.

Lastly, a heartfelt thanks to the 50th Anniversary Co-Chair, Shirley Hill, and all the 50th Anniversary Committee members who worked so hard for a long time to make this all day long celebration a huge success.

Katsuko Brooke
2009 Annual Exhibition Chair

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