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Plant Talk

Inside The New York Botanical Garden

Nolen

Japan’s Kiku Return

Posted in Exhibitions, Kiku on November 5 2012, by Matt Newman

Captured under glass in an intimate snapshot of a generations-old artform, this year’s Kiku collection is now up and running in the Bourke-Sullivan Display House, a wing of the Nolen Greenhouses for Living Collections at the NYBG. And as exhibitions go, this one–as always–is a vital testament to the heights of beauty and expertise that horticulture can reach.

Like so many of our exhibitions, Nolen’s master horticulturists have spent months behind the scenes, sculpting and training otherwise commonplace flowers into shapes unlike anything seen in a workaday home garden. Thousands of chrysanthemum blooms across a rainbow of colors now take on the forms of Ogiku, Ozukuri, and Shino-Tsukuri. Now, those names may strike mysterious chords at first, but they’re easy enough to understand–if not recreate–once you spend a little time with our handy, dandy primer.

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Morning Eye Candy: Kiku Under Glass

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on November 4 2012, by Matt Newman

Just a little peek at the chrysanthemums creating rainbows in the Nolen Greenhouses for Living Collections, where the Bourke-Sullivan Display House is now holding this year’s Kiku creations. If you’ve never seen botanical sculpture at its most essential height, visit the Ozukuri, Kengai, Ogiku, and many other stylistic mum masterpieces from now through Sunday, November 18.

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Morning Eye Candy: Tropicalia

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on October 16 2012, by Matt Newman

Hi from the Nolen Greenhouses for Living Collections! Just wanted to check in on the tropicalia going on behind the glass. We’ll be having more from Nolen as we get into this year’s Kiku displays, which will be viewable there between November 3 and 18, so keep an eye out as we hustle toward the fall exhibitions.

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Monet’s Garden: Preparing the Masterpiece

Posted in Exhibitions, Monet's Garden, Video on May 7 2012, by Matt Newman

Creating a masterpiece takes more than simple inspiration. It requires preparation–arranging each color and readying the canvas. And as with a painting, Monet’s Garden at the NYBG is a work of art with as much going on behind the scenes as happens in the open.

Marc Hachadourian, Manager of the Nolen Greenhouses for Living Collections, takes us through the expansive collection of delphiniums, poppies, nasturtiums and other flowers that will soon embody our homage to Claude Monet’s garden at Giverny. Months of careful tending in specialized growing environments have allowed us to tease the flowers into bloom all at once, re-creating the artist’s living muse at its kaleidoscopic peak. But you won’t have to wait that long to see them.

If you haven’t reserved your tickets yet, get to our ticket page! The doors to the French master’s private paradise open to New York on May 19.