Hi, I would have voted for #2, the monkey thorn. Your tree is healthy, has a appearance of maturity, and over all is much further along in development. So hands down I would have voted for your tree.
If you don't mind, as a critique, I'll offer some thoughts. First the pot is a nice pot, probably Yi Xing, from China. They are well made pots. Often that style pot is used for Cymbidium orchids, think a grassy fountain of leaves and a cascading stem of flowers. They use them for cascading Penjing too. Frequently with a pot that tall, the cascade comes down to below the base of the pot, and ends just above the base of the stand that the was made for the pot. Your cascade is too short for the pot, it needs to come down further if you want to keep it in this pot. The color of the pot works better when the tree has leaves. If you keep them as a combo, I would continue the cascade to just below the base of the pot. If you keep the cascade shorter, then a shorter, Japanese style semi-cascade pot would be in order. Your acacia has somewhat of a penjing feel, but not strong enough that someone would immediately think Penjing, you might consider taking it more a Chinese style if you want to keep the pot and tree paired. If you have the cascade come over the corner of the pot, still keep the trunk as near to dead center of the pot as possible. Don't know if you can, but that is what I would do.
I do like your accent, but not necessarily with your tree. Again the whole display was not quite coherent. BUT, all that said, it was better than the Juniper. Your display at least had some thought put into it.
In terms of future development for the acacia, I noticed many of the branches were fairly long and straight. I would consider reducing all the straight branches to short single node lengths, and then work on getting more movement in them. You want more zig zags, up and down and left and right. Some of your straight branches are just too long without forking or turning. If you are not in a hurry, clip and grow might be better than trying to do this with wire. Or a combination of clip and grow and wiring would be quickest. But I really like the age, the fat nebari, and the development of your trunk. You have a nice start there. More than a start, it is now the branching that needs the focus. Your main trunk is great.
The juniper looks in poor health, as others said, the cascade branch looks so weak I doubt it will survive. It was nice material, but like any cascade, you must keep the upper portion pruned short to keep it from sacrificing the cascade branch in favor of the upper parts of the tree. I would have never brought a tree that unhealthy in for display. Not to mention the wiring job. If you looked only at the "potential tree" and not the actual tree on display, the juniper certainly had a lot of potential, but looking at what was actually displayed, that juniper looked like it was going to drop the cascading branch if not expire entirely.
It's a very cool tree...and I always think to myself...2D also doesn't show the tree at its full potential. So it's even grander in person. Congrats on having it on your bench.
