Renee's Garden Seeds: Renee's Blog

Wednesday, February 12, 2014

NW Flower and Garden Show Lifts the Spirits

by Sue Shecket - webmaster and NW Trial Gardener

The NW Flower and Garden show displays were absolutely wonderful this year and I spent a delightful day absorbing the sights and smells that inspire me to get those seeds started and pull out my pruning shears. The theme was “Art in Bloom” and the designers came through with some very creative and lovely displays – lots of glass (we do have Dale Chilhuly here for inspiration) and ideas for creating “natural” paintings and integrating art into the garden.
Despite the challenges of our Super Bowl victory parade on the first day of the show (which brought almost a million people to the downtown streets and created total gridlock) and an unexpected and very unusual snowstorm on the last day, there were plenty of smiling faces with arms full of purchases strolling the aisles and attending the many excellent workshops. If you are in the area next year (or just need an excuse to visit) do consider coming for the show. It’s a great place to get ideas and get pumped up for the next gardening season.

The "Darwin Orchid" is a huge glass work. The artist wanted to "bring to light the beauty that exists within the micro scale of nature" Live plants around it included many insect eaters.

This charming display included some delightful birdhouses inspired by Dale Chilhuly - who makes them for fun when he's not creating fabulous glass works.

The Arboretum Foundation display incorporated lots of glass art into the setting, including the windows filled with glass floats

Water features are still popular - even in rainy Seattle

West Seattle Nursery's team gave me some great ideas for "live" paintings

Their living wall was quite a hit.

The finger-earth display was amazing -- the twig shapes are actually the artist's fingerprints and the earth is painted flat on the stone but when viewed from the front becomes 3D .