Philadelphia Flower Show

CLICK TO ENLARGE! These are big images with lots of detail
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Monday March 2, I started my day shoveling the sidewalk at 6AM. The snow was steady and promised to keep up all day to the tune of 12-18". I had made plans to meet with a small cohort of gardening friends at Penn Station to take the train down to Philadelphia for the Flower Show.



Despite delays, we got to the Reading Terminal Market in time for an early lunch (my annual dose of Philly Cheese Steak) before crossing the street to the Convention Center.

As always, we were greeted by the most hardworking clichés



and over-the-top showmanship. Yikes!



It takes a short stroll over to the competition area for the exquisite, but less effusive, individual offerings of devoted perfectionists



to ease my annoyance at the crass bombast playing out in the commercial area.



This year's theme was Italia and as always, displays ranged from the sublime



to the ridiculous



The light level is typically so low (read: "dramatic")



that photography is a challenge and there is a kind of malevolent feel about the place.



It's when struggling with all this drama and the limitations of my camera that I am made aware of the sordid backdrop of the whole enterprise.



The Flower Show is a completely artificial, temporary & ephemeral environment that requires monumental coordination and enormous effort to pull off in a space better suited to showing cars and electronic equipment. Tons of dirt are hauled into the joint only to be hauled out again at the end of the week. Horticulturists like to call it soil—same difference to me—go figure, if it makes them feel good not to call it dirt, you don't see much of it in any of the exhibits anyway.



We saw the plants on Monday, so they were still quite fresh. But it must be a daunting task to keep these displays properly humidified and perfectly un-wilted.




That the show was also relatively uncrowded (most likely due to the inclement weather) was a pleasant bonus. Students from a local vocal academy were there to perform arias from Italian opera on a raised stage set that looked like the balconies of an Italian villa. Never mind that Doretta's aria from La Rondine was sung in medieval dress. Frank Sinatra recordings crooned in the background from another booth.

A somewhat overwrought, but nonetheless inventive display had yellow tulips and daffodils (cut flowers) sitting in clear plastic water bottles (hundreds of them), lit from below with a cool white light and trelllised in some sort of wierd polypropylene tuteur. An industrial designer's dream. Not unpleasant; there was just a bit too much of it.



Fashion was represented in the form of shoes [not shown here, kind of yucky] and hats, which I found sort of charming.



The ikebana were stunning if garish.



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As always, there were many little treats amongst the sheer profusion of botanica on parade. Some of my favorites:

This little Sempervivum. The color was just as you see it. A "must-have" on my new wishlist.



An azalea which name I did not get, but it is a ringer for the one I painted in 1992. This one was growing as a standard, a giant lollipop of pink & white with red freckles.




This variegated begonia in a terrarium looked positively extraterrestrial.



Lilies. The scent was divine.




Lots of Clivia in every shade from pale yellow through deepest orange, some with beautifully variegated foliage. I couldn't get enough of them, and for some reason, they were very easy to photograph.



This Hammamelis caught my eye. I didn't get the variety name.




This bromeliad was part of a psychedelic-looking display featuring colored lights. A bit much, but the forms were beautiful.



And finally, a begonia that looked alarmingly like some wallpaper that was in a house we once moved into, and that we peeled off immediately in favor of a plain white wall. Amazing what context can do.



And then...I moved on to the "marketplace" portion of the show. This is where all my best intentions come to naught. I am, these days, completely unemployed, except for my studio work which hasn't earned me anything since last May. So it goes without saying that I couldn't afford to buy anything. But, when I stumbled into the booth with the little minature pots of exotic tropicals, I knew I was in trouble. Well, the prospect of a long trek back up the (by now) dark North East Corridor by train in a miserable snow storm brought me to my senses before much harm was done. And this sunny (but cold) morning I am delighting in the delicate details of: a variegated baby Jade (Portulacaria), Nemntanthus, variegated Trachelospermum jasminoides, South African squill, Singapore Holly (Malpighia coccigera), Comprosma kirkii, a pink Serissa, and a white rabbit's foot fern (Humata tyermaniii). But all that's for another post