This was a collaboration between Lu Hsin, a landscape architect, and me during her final master’s thesis on an ethnobotanical garden in Taiwan at AHO, the Oslo School of Architecture and Design.

Known as Formosa, or “beautiful island,” Taiwan is home to diverse and historic plant life, including Taiwania cryptomerioides, one of Asia’s tallest trees. The illustration presents 13 endemic and native species found in Snow Mountain, a serene area in eastern Taichung, Taiwan, symbolizing the island’s rich natural heritage.

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Thirteen trees were hand-drawn in pencil by the two of us, while I designed the rest of the composition in Adobe Illustrator. The illustration uses a scale bar and a colour palette to depict the height and seasonal changes of these trees.

The background image shows the silhouette of Xueshan Mountain, also known as Snow Mountain, which is 3,886 metres high.

The roots were sourced from Wageningen University & Research Image Collections.