NYBG: The Orchid Show

Before we went to the backstage tour at the Met, my uncle and I traveled to the Bronx (his first time, my second) for the Orchid Show at the New York Botanical Gardens. I love flowers and plants, in part I think, because I cannot for the life of me keep them alive. We always joked that my mom had a "black thumb" and killed supposedly kill-resistant things like chia pets and cacti. I'm sorry to say that I definitely inherited that trait, although perhaps to a lesser degree. I've managed to keep a few house plants alive for a few years, and the roses and Gerbera Daisies in our yard have somehow thrived despite my neglect. I think it's because of this that I have a fascination and extreme respect for beautiful foliage.

I've been to the Brooklyn Botanic garden in the spring, as well as a week ago, but I had never been to the larger New York garden. It's in the same park as the Bronx Zoo, and fairly easy to get to. If you take the subway (B/D), it's about a six block walk to the entrance on Mosholu Parkway. Thursday was a snowy day, but always on the verge of rain, so it wasn't too frigid. We arrived at the garden a little after 10am, expecting crowds but thankfully there were only a few other people milling about. Admission to the Orchid Show also gets you into the rest of the grounds, but we were on a somewhat tight time schedule so we just stuck to the orchids.

The Enid A. Haupt conservatory is a beautiful, enormous glass enclosure and nearly every room was just bursting with orchids and other wonderful plants. They also had flowering gardenias, grapefruits, lemons, enormous ferns and a desert section with various cacti. But of course, it's the orchids that steal the spotlight whenever they can.

They have an incredible amount of variety — ones that smell like chocolate, ones that look like slippers, ones that are printed like a giraffe, big ones, small ones and ones that look like tulips. Orchids are strange creatures — some even look like aliens. I wish I could have bottled the scent of the entire show, it was so lovely. It was nice to breathe in the sweet-scented, warm, moist air on such a dreary day, and after spending a few hours with the orchids I can definitively say I'm ready for spring.

I would love to go back to the garden for their take on the flowering cherries, but alas I leave for Ohio tomorrow (eek!). I did, however, pick up a copy of Susan Orlean's The Orchid Thief to reread — have you read it? If you've seen Adaptation you know that it's nearly impossible to explain without sounding dull, but believe me when I say it's anything but. Orlean is a fantastic writer, and the subject of passion, obsession and collecting is one that will always be near to my heart. It's even more interesting to revisit her words after I've seen a lot of what she describes, and she even mentions that some of the orchid varieties currently at the NYBG have been there since the late 1800s.

The show runs until April 22nd, and I highly recommend checking it out, and while you're there you can pick up a copy of the Orchid Thief, conveniently available in the gift shop.