Sakura Matsuri at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens

There are times that you witness great beauty equipped with only your iPhone.

In my experience, as long as the sun is brightly shining, you have nothing to fear. Snap away with your iPhone and you can expect clear, well-defined photos with a little bit of automatic depth-of-field play.

Note that I took the photos below with an iPhone 3GS–not even the most advanced iPhone camera on the market.

Thanks to my roommate Sam, I learned that this past weekend was the Sakura Matsuri Festival at the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens. Joseph and I went there a bit late on Sunday afternoon, but when we arrived the sun was still shining and we had plenty of time to explore the gorgeous gardens. I’m not sure we saw any cherry blossoms but we walked around as much as we could, and we enjoyed a path through overflowing lilacs and fields of bluebells.

Looking outside today, it’s hard to believe that it’s actually May Day. These photographs will constitute my own little celebration of spring.

The peony collection wasn’t blooming yet, but the Japanese tree peonies were. Some were arch and pink like the first photo, above; others were shy and demure young ladies, like the blossom below.