Peeps on Pumpkins, Beautiful Decay Pt.1

     One of my biggest inspirations has always been a beautifully decaying object. Paint peeling on doors, vines overtaking an abandoned house... all extremely satisfying to me. There is a bit of rebellion in it, like mother nature is saying "yeah, you tried to beat time, but that just isn't how things work, and you are gonna like it... move on."  

A decaying object is intimate and exposed, showing its age and past.

This kind of mentality and fascination has led people to tell me I am a bit gothic and morbid. I hate the word gothic in it's modern context (let's all go shop at Hot Topic and talk about how miserable we are) because I love life so much. I love joy and life and beautiful flowers.... but I also have an odd habit of reading about how dead bodies decay, serial killers, ghost towns, and cannibals. I think that if our world was all full of pansies and brand new shiny things, it would be a boring world. We need death to appreciate life, we need dark to appreciate light, and we need to recognize that sometimes things we consider to be dark, can be beautiful too. I guess this is a Yin and Yang thing.  I don't like to think of it as dark and depressing.

If you ever have time to visit the Los Angeles Artist Colony known as The Brewery, then you can witness some of the ways the residents there have chosen to embrace the urban decay around them into whimsical little gardens and cozy studios. This place used to be an old Pabst Brewery, and now it is one of the largest artist colonies in the world.

This peep is choosing to live out his last days(which could be a long time based on the sugar content) in an overgrown garden atop a pumpkin. delightful.

This little display, while cobwebbed and old, has a lot of feel to it. The rust adds texture and color. 

Surrounding all these rusty bits, vines with beautiful flowers intertwine  themselves between cracks and broken walls. The contrast is exciting to me.

I have always had a morbid fascination with old dolls. I can't STAND dolls. They freak me out. Yet I can't seem to stop taking pictures of them. Is there perhaps a bit of sick joy in seeing them humorously rotting away in a planter? Perhaps. Perhaps.

I fell in love with this succulent so much, I bought a baby one for my terrarium. Dark and beautiful.