This sculpture is in orange alabaster, from the Mid-West of the USA. It is quite a rare stone and impossible to find in the UK. It is very beautiful when the light shines through it.

‘Flower’ is 2″ high and 2″ wide which made it really difficult to carve as I had to place it delicately in the palm of one hand and file it into shape. It was so small that I couldn’t use chisels and a mallet. Gouging out the inside of the flower by hand was also a challenge.

I wanted to give my 97 year old aunt, Lily Rose, either a lily or a rose, but the stone had a mind of its own and it dictated what it wanted to evolve into, so it became just ‘Flower!’