Cotton's Secret

It is easy to find beauty in the plants around us. Sometimes we forget they contain complicated networks for transporting water and nutrients throughout their parts. Hidden inside the stem of the cotton plant, depicted here in fabrics derived from its harvest, are the beautiful structures that carry on the work necessary for life. At first glance we notice the organic, circular bodies in the tissues, but on closer inspection we see geometric forms, including the hexagon, a familiar patchwork motif. These structures exist in other plants, of course, but knowing these shapes are present naturally, inside the plant we rely on so heavily in the quilting arts, is a delightful secret to carry with us. Based on Claudio Divizia’s image of a cotton stem under 400x magnification.