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The setting we spend the most time in the first chapter is Gardener's House. It is inspired by architecture and interior design from the Edo Period. Most importantly I wanted her house to feel lush and full of life, as she is the "Gardener" and views the entire meadow as her garden, so I filled her house with flora and trickling waterfalls.
The titular location, the Meadow, is based on locations both real and fictional. I pulled inspiration from landscapes in Studio Ghibli movies, such as the screencap pictured from Howl's Moving Castle. I was also inspired by the real-life meadows of Lassen Volcanic National Park in northern California. The meadow is meant to seem calming, thus I used a lot of cool blue tones. As the story progresses, the Meadow will get more and more blue to symbolize Petal moving deeper and deeper into the unknown.
Typically, meadows are seen as safe and welcoming, while the woods are dangerous and unknown. However, in this story, I tried to subvert this trope by having "home" be the woods, and the "unknown" be the meadow.
Although in the first chapter we only see it very briefly, Petal's home is narratively very significant and will be featured at length later on. I wanted Petal's home to match her warm color palette and thus I heavily relied on yellow tones. She is meant to look like she belongs there, as opposed to the contrasting cool tones of the Meadow.
It was inspired by real-life forests in Colorado and Wyoming.
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