Nature Journaling Prompt: Plant Portrait Series
Hear from Marketing Assistant Tammy Xiao about their entry for our December Nature Journaling Prompts hosted by Wild Wonder.
By Tammy Xiao
December 15th’s prompt: Plant Portrait Series: Today you’ll unleash your inner botanist. Go on a hunt to collect three different specimens of the same plant. For example, you could choose the leaf, root, and flower of a plant, or alternatively the stem, seed, and fruit. Capture their variations in your journal and note the details, such as size and any other identifying descriptions, in words. Check out Bethan’s Garden Journaling Workshop for creative ways to magnify and capture specific details visually.
Plant Portrait by Tammy Xiao
I loved Brooke’s playful use of space in her entries of Art Toolkit’s shared nature journal. The arching line of her December 14th text left a natural border for my sketches of the Western Redcedar (Thuja plicata).
I felt an immediate resonance with the Western Redcedar when I moved to the Pacific Northwest. It reminded me of the Hinoki cypress, which is known for its antimicrobial properties and calming fragrance and used as the building material for bathtubs and shrines in Japan, where I lived for many years.
Diving into my favorite plant guide, Plants of the Pacific Northwest Coast, I found that Western Redcedar held a similarly symbolic and functional purpose for indigenous people: “Cedars provided for [indigenous] people from birth until death, from cradles to coffins,” the authors write. All parts of the plant were cherished, from the bark to the roots and branches, which were used to make everything from water-resistant clothing, baskets and fish traps to shelters.
They add that “the power of the redcedar tree was said to be so strong person could receive strength by standing with his or her back to the tree. Redcedar was used for a variety of ailments. It is called the ‘tree of life’ by the Kwakwaka’wakw and is still held with the highest respect by all northwest coast peoples for its healing and spiritual powers.”
For my sketch, I used a Kakuno Fountain Pen and Converter with De Atramentis Brown Document ink, and painted the bark and cones with the Demi Palette mentioned in Maria’s post. Lastly, I taped in the leaf with Washi Tape.
—Tammy Xiao
To read more about the month of nature journaling prompts, and to see the full list of prompts, click here. Be sure to tag your art with #NatureJournaling2026 and #ArtToolkitFridayPrompt for a chance to be featured on our blog and Instagram!