Tomorrow is your chance to support educational nutrition programs for children when you buy nutritious food for yourself! Our friends at Whole Foods Market® will donate 5% of their daily net sales on June 25 to the programs and activities of NYBG’s Edible Academy and the award-winning Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden.
NYBG has always worked to reconnect children with nature, with a special focus on where their food comes from. At the Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden, kids engage in hands-on gardening activities that teach them the benefits of naturally grown vegetables, fruits and herbs. The Edible Academy includes plans for a new, state-of-the-art building that will serve as the hub for edible education at NYBG.
Tomorrow you can help us get closer to that reality when you shop at any one of dozens of Whole Foods Markets across New York and New Jersey. Click through for the full list of participating locations and find the closest one to you!
It won’t be long now ’til Michael Arenella’s swinging away, horn in hand, backed by a wall of golden sound courtesy of his Dreamland Orchestra. For three exclusive events this summer, the legendary host and band leader of the famed Jazz Age Lawn Parties of Governor’s Island is setting up shop in NYBG—and everyone’s got an invitation waiting! The first of our Jazz Age Evenings takes place this Thursday, June 26, leaving you with just enough time to snag a few tickets and don your finest flapper ensemble.
That’s not to say period-appropriate outfits are required, though we’re certainly all for them.
Jazz Age Evenings are a chance to not only indulge in the swing, hot jazz, and big band melodies of Arenella and his renowned band, but to indulge in a specialty cocktail and stroll through our Groundbreakersexhibition. Intimate after-dark lighting in the Conservatory sets the tone for a memorable night out unlike anything you’ll find in New York City.
This Thursday night’s opening event features a spicy take on one of my personal favorite drinks. Crabbie’s Moscow Mule combines what I’ll call a “kicked up” ginger beer with crisp vodka and a touch of lime for a drink equal parts punchy and piquant. Remember: this is only the first of three special nights at NYBG, so you’ll have other chances to join us if you miss out on this week’s opening. But don’t wait too long—tickets are available now. Oh, and for those of you looking to make a full night of it, MasterCard holders are welcome to join us for our champagne pre-party in the Shop in the Garden. More info here!
“Classic” doesn’t mean bland. During our Groundbreakers exhibition, some of the Conservatory plantings in our “hot” and “cold” borders—inspired by the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Garden in Maine—flirt with the color schemes of candy dots or fireworks. And it’s so very good.
Cutting back the Native Plant Garden’s meadow a few months ago left many wondering how quickly it would spring up again. The answer wasted no time getting here, and just in time for today’s summer solstice.
Split Rock in the Native Plant Garden – Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen
Happy Friday! Looks like we are in store for a beautiful weekend. The humidity has abated, the temperature will not be near the highs of this week, and the Garden grounds promise to be simply stunning!
After the success of last weekend’s Big Backyard BBQ & Music Festival, this weekend sees a return to our scheduled programming surrounding Groundbreakers and what’s in bloom. The 2014 Spring Festival Series has officially come to an end—after all, it’s not spring anymore. Saturday is the first official day of summer, and the longest day of the year! Where better to take advantage of the all that sunlight than at NYBG? Come enjoy tours of the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden while it is still at peak form! Read on for details about this weekend’s programs for all ages.
Todd Forrest is the NYBG’s Arthur Ross Vice President for Horticulture and Living Collections. He leads all horticulture programs and activities across the Garden’s 250-acre National Historic Landmark landscape, including 50 gardens and plant collections outside and under glass, the old-growth Thain Family Forest, and living exhibitions in the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory.
The flowers of Penstemon cobaea var. purpurea are much larger than those of the other beard-tongues in the Native Plant Garden.
I am batty for beard-tongues. No, I don’t mean the furry-mouthed feeling that people with actual social lives get after long nights of too many cocktails, I mean the more than 250 species of Penstemon, a genus of perennials and biennials native to North America from the Maine woods to the alpine meadows of Idaho and the deserts of California. With tall clusters of flowers as beautiful as their common name is ugly (the moniker beard-tongue refers to tufts of hair that emerge from the sterile fifth stamen of certain species), beard-tongues carry late spring in the Native Plant Garden.
The most common beard-tongue in cultivation is Penstemon digitalis ‘Husker Red’, selected in 1983 by Dr. Dale Lindgren of the University of Nebraska for its maroon leaves, long-lasting inflorescences of white flowers, and extreme hardiness (it thrives in Nebraska!). We planted ‘Husker Red’ in the Native Border, where its flowers bridge the gap between the peaks of mid-spring and mid-summer bloom, and its foliage adds a dash of welcome color throughout the growing season.
At the heart of our Groundbreakersexhibition stand six women—three of them designers, three of them photographers—who, through combined efforts, effected a sea change in the style and popularity of the American garden. From Beatrix Farrand’s opus of the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Garden in Seal Harbor, Maine, to Marian Coffin’s timeless creations here at NYBG, formerly staid home gardens in the U.S. shrugged off western Europe’s stylistic dominance for new and exciting influences from other cultures—not to mention those found right here at home.
Groundbreakers: Great American Gardens and The Women Who Designed Them is an homage to that renaissance of the early 20th century, when these six women established themselves not only as successful designers, but as pioneers along a fresh course for the country’s green spaces.
Tomorrow is your chance to support educational nutrition programs for children when you buy nutritious food for yourself! Our friends at Whole Foods Market® will donate 5% of their daily net sales on June 25 to the programs and activities of NYBG’s Edible Academy and the award-winning Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden.
