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The Lorenzen's Ceramic Mushroom Collection includes over two hundred unique mushrooms native to Nova Scotia. A single mushroom takes about 15 days to complete from clay sculpture to final firing.

The Lorenzens who created the mushrooms are not native Nova Scotians. Ernst came from Denmark and Alma was a New Brunswick native. In 1949, they worked full time as artists and potters in their studio in Lantz, Nova Scotia. Ernst developed his own glazes using mineral deposits they collected from around the province to get the realistic colors for the mushrooms.

Clavaria amethystina

Nova Scotia has the ideal climate (high humidity and moderate temperatures) for the growth

of mushrooms, which are prone to dehydation since they lack an outer protective covering.

Some mushroom species have not been found anywhere else in the world. Mycologists consider this area to be a mushroom paradise with over seven thousand species.

They thrive in this area and are abundant in September and October. This provides a rich playground for Alma and Ernst Lorenzen to create the Lorenzen ceramic mushroom collection.

In the fall of 1949, Alma Lorenzen, on a field trip looking for mineral deposits with her husband, Ernst, almost stepped on a mushroom called Coprinus micaceus. She was intrigued by the variety of colors and shapes of this fragile species.

The spark had been ignited and she began her journey to collect as many species of mushrooms as she could find. Alma, encouraged by her husband, created a ceramic model of Horn of Plenty (Craterellus cornucopoides) which she displayed in her shop in Lantz, Nova Scotia.

A professor of botany from Laval University in Quebec visited the shop in Lantz and was impressed by the authentic mushroom model with its exact size and color. He quickly purchased it and requested other models to add to his collection, thus the Lorenzen's life work of sculpturing mushrooms began.

The collection resides in the McCulloch Museum in the Life Science Center of Dalhousie University.

The collection was donated by Dr. Constance McFarlane in 1976. She was a graduate of the Biology Department at Dalhousie University and made the arrangements for the purchase and donation of the ceramic mushroom models.

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