Stone Island - Art Nouveau and Sakura

This year I prepared for the cherry blossoms very carefully. I found out in advance which gardens in our city have cherry blossoms, and I thought of tentative walking routes to admire the blossoms. I've also bookmarked the Botanical Gardens website. On that site, you can keep track of when flowers and trees begin to bloom.

The bloom calendar compiled by the Botanical Garden staff did not let me down. I caught the start of flowering as the first buds began to bloom and I was able to admire the blossoms in several gardens over several days. But as far as address information was concerned, it wasn't all that accurate.

Some of the addresses did not raise any questions. They have long been well known to all lovers of oriental culture. There are several gardens in our city that are decorated in an oriental style, with sakura bushes planted in these gardens during special events, meetings and festivals. But some other addresses I didn't know before, and they raised my doubts.

The thing about sakura is that they don't grow well in our climate. Sakura seedlings are very expensive and difficult to grow. On the other hand apple trees, plum trees and other fruit trees are quite common, and do not require such complicated care. The flowers of some trees are very similar to those of the sakura. Casual passers-by often confuse them. I assumed that some of the information about sakura tree locations would be false, so I downloaded a picture in advance that shows sakura flowers compared to those of other trees.

One of the addresses I was going to visit was the Quiet Rest Park on Stone Island. Stone Island was once an outskirt of the city and a countryside area, but has long since fallen inside the city limits. It's a unique place in its own way. The construction boom has bypassed this island, with no apartment buildings springing up here. The construction of Kamenný Island consists of stone and wooden mansions.

At the beginning of the 20th century, several Art Nouveau-style mansions were built on Kamenný ostrov. One of the most memorable mansions is called Dacha Gausswald. I purposely approached this building, although it wasn't exactly on the road. The fact is that this mansion had been in a state of disrepair for a long time and had been condemned for demolition. Fortunately, the mansion's new owner had carried out some very thorough and very expensive restoration work. I went over to Dacha Gauswald on purpose, to admire the façade and to take a few photos.

Nearby is another Art Nouveau monument, the Vollenweider Mansion. The romantic appearance of the mansion, with its tiled roof and hipped tower, evokes associations with ancient castles. In summer, the mansion will be almost completely hidden by the dense foliage, but for now the foliage is scarce and the architectural details can be seen.

Quiet Rest Park occupies the central part of the island. My favourite trees in this park are the old willows on the bank of the pond. But this time I was looking for other trees - and indeed, I had no trouble finding them. The crowns of the small trees, adorned with pink flowers, were visible from afar. Passers-by often stopped by the trees to admire the blossoms and take photos.

At first I thought those trees looked exactly like the sakura trees near the Japanese gazebo I had seen the day before. But then I looked more closely and some doubts arose. The cherry blossoms cluster together to form what look like clusters. In these trees, the shape of the flowers and their colour looked very similar but the individual flowers were not joined together.

Perhaps these botanical clarifications don't make much sense. All flowering trees are very beautiful and I am equally willing to admire any tree in bloom. Especially if you have to go for a walk to a beautiful place like Stone Island to do so.

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Smartphone	Google Pixel 3a
Location	Saint Petersburg, Russia

This is my entry for the #WednesdayWalk challenge by @tattoodjay and for the #MakeMeSmile challenge by @elizacheng.