Chrysanthemum Grafted with One Hundred Varieties

An awestruck crowd presses forward to see an enormous chrysanthemum plant bearing flowers of a hundred different varieties of chrysanthemums, each identified by name on a dangling white label.

This botanical wonder is said to have been created by carefully grafting cuttings of different chrysanthemums onto a central stem—a technical feat made all the more extraordinary in that all of the flowers bloomed simultaneously.

Kuniyoshi's print is the only existing visual record of this legendary plant, which, according to the text at the top of the right-hand print, was the work of a garden specialist named Imauemon.

In recent years, inspired by Kuniyoshi's print, modern Japanese botanists re-created this "Chrysanthemum Grafted with One Hundred Varieties." The plant was exhibited to great acclaim at the 2003 Japan Flower Festival in Toyohashi, Aichi prefecture.