10 years ago, if we mentioned Spain in the world of aquascaping, many would say "Spain who?"
But today, if we talk about aquascaping, Spain will be among the first few nations to be mentioned!!! They have grown so much in the last few years, individually and as a nation. As a result, they have overtaken the traditional strong European aquascaping countries like France, Germany and Italy to become the number 1 aquascaping stronghold in Europe.
The 10 years IAPLC result and Average Ranking Graph show how remarkable Spain has developed from practically an unknown country in the aquascaping world to the Leader in Europe that are capable of challenging the top honours with the rest of the world. In the last 4 years, all the top5 scapers coming from Spain are in the top100 world ranking - something that only the mighty Brazilian and the traditional Asian powerhouses (Vietnam, China and Japan) can achieve. This demonstrate an enviable strength in the Spanish team that they already have a matured team with scapers ready to fight for the country. One of the leader and top scapers from Spain told us that Spanish team's strategy or goal is not to aim for Top7 individual ranking (but we can be sure they are fully capable of achieving that), instead, the Spanish team aim to get as many scapers into the top50 as possible! That is exactly how this Nations Challenge works - do not depend on individual heroic but fight as a team!
Spanish aquascaping style has a good mixture of everything, a little bit NA, a little bit of Iwagumi/mountain, a little bit of forest, a little bit of Brazilian style, a little of woods and rocks combine! This well balanced and good mixture of style has enriched the Spanish layout and make it refreshingly unpredictable.
One thing we can observe though, layout photos from the Spanish team tend to have a more subdue colour tone - not very bright or colourful, but more moody, mysterious and heavy. This give the layouts from Spain a powerful feeling and a unique identity. Maybe it is a Spanish preference or a pure coincident - please clarify with your Spanish aquascaping friends for more details.
Strength and Weakness
One of the biggest strength has been mentioned before - they are a matured team with scapers in their prime that is ready to battle. There is no weak link in the Spanish team - their 1st to 5th (and more) members are all top scapers! They have gone through the development and grooming phases, they have enough good scapers to form a formidable team! Another advantage that the Spanish team has, is their local contest - AQSC. We have mentioned before that countries that have internal contest is crucial in developing their local talent - France, Brazil, Spain and others. It is a good channel to discover and encourage newcomers to participate in competitive aquascaping.
Before the younger scapers excel international, the local contest is an excellent training ground to learn and gain experience/confidence.
As for weakness....basically there are none. Perhaps if we really have to pick one (just to be fair to other nations), Spanish layouts are all beautiful and marvellous, but.....can you pinpoint a Spanish layout that you can vividly remember? To the rest of the world, we know Spain as a strong aquascaping nation and all their layouts are with very high quality, however, perhaps they lack some individual breakthrough that can bring them from a top5 nation to a top3 nations. Imagine....with all their top5 scapers ranking highly in the top100, what if they can have 1 or 2 scapers in the top7...that will surely propel this nations to a new height!! We believe this day will come very soon!
Author: IAPLC Nations Challenge
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