This year, Christine and I again traveled to Philadelphia to attend the annual Flower Show. This is our third visit to the show. We registered with the local Cornell Cooperative Extension for their bus trip. At 6:30 a.m. three packed buses left for the drive to Philadelphia. The trip down was uneventful, but agonizing once we got to Philadelphia. Getting to the convention center was awful. This was “bus day” at the show and so 200+ buses from all over the mid-Atlantic and New England states were pouring into Philadelphia. Ugh! It took over an hour to go about 20 blocks to where we could disembark. We all wanted the driver to just stop and let us off so we could walk the couple of blocks to the show, but NO, he couldn’t do that. At any rate, we finally did arrive and into the show we went.
This year’s theme is the Wonders of Water celebrating the beauty and life-sustaining interplay of horticulture and water. America’s leading floral and garden designers created tropical jungles, temperate forests, native woodlands and arid landscapes, showcasing the astounding plants that thrive in each environment, from exquisite orchids and flowering vines to luminescent desert blooms. The show consumes 10 acres of space in the convention center and it is amazing how the exhibitors transform a huge, concrete-floored cavernous space into such works of art.
The entrance to the show this year was dominated by a huge rain forest. There was a very large structure of many levels of bamboo platforms and things hanging by ropes and waterfalls and ponds and rainfall. The whole area was chockablock full of plants and flowers, most of which were glistening from the mist and rain. What made it really special was the piped in sounds of birds and other animals which might be in a rain forest.
We kept going back to this display because it was so lovely to walk through and around.
One of the difficult things for us at this flower show was the very large crowd. It was more crowded than anyone had seen and we overheard many people remarking on the large crowd. A particular reason for this was the approaching Nor’easter storm heading to the mid-Atlantic and New England areas. We figured that lots of people came on Tuesday in advance of the storm Wednesday and Thursday. The crowd did lessen our enjoyment because it was difficult to walk around and picture-taking was a challenge because everyone was jostling to get the same shot. But we persevered and viewed all the exhibits.
It’s truly amazing how the space was converted. In some areas, one would never think you were indoors at a convention center.
Several of the displays were related to a water-related aspect occurring within a country. We learned that Papua New Guinea is one of the worst performing countries in the world for rural access to clean water. Access to water is a daily struggle for 67% of the rural population.
In China, industry pollutes many of the rivers. In several instances, the factory discharge into the rivers turns the water red.
In the U.S., the story of pipe deterioration was presented. As many as 63 million people, nearly a fifth of the U.S., were exposed to potentially unsafe water more than once during the past decade. Flint, MI and Toledo, OH are two areas having the worst pipe deterioration.
Shrinking fresh water supplies will be the world’s demise unless we find solutions to this global crisis. The display at the Flower Show brought this message to the forefront.
But onward through the Flower Show. As I said, the expanse of the convention center is amazing and everywhere you look there is some foliage or flower or interesting artistic display.
There was a display that looked like a huge quilt hanging on the wall that I especially liked. Each large block was some sort of fern or other foliage.
There was the cutest miniature display titled Clarke’s Clamshell Cafe. All of the figures were made from shells. It was a hoot!
And, of course, there were the tulips and other spring bulbs. What gorgeous colors!
Occasionally, there was something really funny – like this.
Two years ago, if anyone remembers seeing my blog post from that visit to the show, I kind of went overboard on orchid photos. I thought this year’s orchid judging display was much smaller, so I didn’t take as many photos. But here are a few. Orchids really are such beautiful and interesting plants.
Here are some other scenes from around the show.
One of the things we learned is that there is a new variety of hellebore, Lenten Rose. We have some in our garden, but they are a bit of a disappointment because the flowers are short-stemmed and droop downward so you can’t see their lovely blooms. We learned that someone now has bred an upright hellebore. It was lovely.
We heard a presentation about carnivorous plants which was quite interesting. These types of plants grow in bogs, and so we learned how to create bogs in containers and in landscapes.
Here’s a Lady’s Slipper Orchid that was really interesting. These are the kinds of fabulous flowers that are tucked in among some of the displays and if you aren’t looking carefully, you could miss out on these wonderful flowers.
We saw several very brightly colored flowers that we, at first, thought were a variety of primrose because the foliage is similar. However, this is Calceolaria whose common names are lady’s purse, slipper flower and pocketbook flower. We loved this plant.
There were several judged exhibitions including floral designs, floral rooms, jewelry (made of plant material), pressed flowers artwork, and miniature floral designs. It’s difficult to take photos of these things due to how the exhibits are displayed. But here are a couple of examples.
We also wandered around all the vendor stalls looking at the multitude of arts, crafts, tools, garden accessories, etc. There were a couple hundred vendors. I think this is probably more the draw for many. People were buying all kinds of stuff.
We were getting very tired by late afternoon. Our bus was departing at 6:00 and so we walked across the street to the Reading Terminal Market to pick up some dinner to eat on the bus. This market is amazing and overwhelming in terms of trying to figure out what to eat.
We eventually boarded the bus and headed back to Binghamton.
The forecast was for the storm to strike around 10:00 p.m. We encountered a little rain, but fortunately no real snow. And we were home just before 10:00. It was a long tiring day, but well worth it.
And as an aside, the Nor’easter hit further to the east and the 8-12 inches of snow we were supposed to get did not materialize in Binghamton. We dodged that bullet! The storm hit the mid-Atlantic coast and up into New England. Those folks who went to the Flower Show early made the right choice because Philly got slammed Tuesday night into Wednesday.
Now I want winter to be over and spring to arrive so I can go out and dig in the garden!