Here's the link for the RI Flower Show....

Don't forget your camera!

Sue

Here is a link that might be useful: RI Flower Show Link

I was at the Hartford show this afternoon (Friday). Found it useful from a business perspective but I wasn't overly impressed. $13 admission and $7 to park to see what one can see in the south and west often for free. Couple dozen vendors selling items unrelated to gardening (costume jewelry, handbags, oriental rugs,kids toys). Some nice large displays for those looking to spend serious money on landscaping. A few artists worth a look. Nice burgundy glass hummingbird feeders. More dried herb dip booths with samples than anyone would want to sample. Very few seeds for sale. Some plants including a small cactus display. UConn has free soil ph testing so bring a dry sample of your soil (mail-in kits for a more detailed analysis are $5 at the UConn booth). Prices on some of the higher end items are good. Found a fountain for $1,600 which would be 25%-30% higher anywhere else. If you go, remember this is at the Hartford convention center downtown, not the Expo center north of the city. There is a liquidation computer/something else sale at Expo and parking lot attendents were turning cars back to the Convention center one after the next (including us).

We went to both shows, Thursday to CT, today to RI. I won a 2nd place in the CT show for a botanical collection of pitcher plants, and we helped out at the NECPS info booth at the RI show.

I thought the Federated Garden Club displays were larger at the CT Show, but otherwise liked the Providence much much better.

My wife and I both agreed the display gardens at the RI show were really stunning and more artistic than the CT ones. At the RI show we picked up some herbs and a sack of 20 ranunculus bulbs for 10 bucks.

It was a flat rate of $8 to park at the RI show, and it cost us $11 to park at the CT show - even though I had phoned beforehand and they said it would be a $8 event rate. ($3.00 first hour, and $2 each additional hour). There is another CT parking area "Pequot" for 5 bucks where you can take a shuttle bus in to the expo, but we didn't want to wait around in the cold & wet waiting for a shuttle.

For any of the CT Plant Swappers - we saw Ron from Youngs nursery at their booth and we talked with him a while. Also, Broken Arrow nursery didn't have any Witchhazel for sale at their booth but they did give out 10% discount cards to use at their nursery. We also liked the red glass hand blown hummingbird feeders.

Bill & Dena

Popped into Hartford for a few hours yesterday. Avoided the commerce area and just wandered the displays. Congrats to Bill!!! Some nice things, but nothing that shouted "Duplicate Me!!!." Took the shuttle and it really wasn't bad. How could I have missed Ron??

For $13 (my ticket was a gift but I would've paid it) it was a tremendous break from the real world.

Martie

Hit the Hartford show for a couple of hours this morning. I took a bunch of pictures and will post them later tonight. As far as the live displays go, I wasn't wowed by anything-too many built in grills and patio tables staged with wine glasses...lol. IMO, the CT Hort Society display was the most detailed and imaginative. The vendors were same old, same old. Besides the 2007 Natureworks catalog all I bought was something totally unrelated to gardening, a piece of sterling silver jewelry. I was impressed by the new convention center. Due to our whirlwind tour we managed to get out of the parking garage for five bucks.

For me, the best reason to go to this show is to see and smell spring a couple of months before it actually happens at a time when you seem to need to see and smell it the most. Now it's time to bring on the real gardening.

Sue

Here are the pictures I took at the show in Hartford today. As I said earlier and others seem to agree-nothing to knock your socks off.

Sue

Here is a link that might be useful: CT Flower & Garden Show 2007

Appreciate the photos Sue. Forgot my camera. Oddly enough the "Not my style but...." photo will come in handy. The rocks remined my sister of Ireland and she has plans bubbling in her head already. She'll like all the photos but that one best.

I went to the RI show today. I start to get excited about gardening again about the time of the shows. I loved the sculpture, but the plant material was run of the mill. And I'd love to go to a flower show that banned all vendors that do not sell stuff related to flowers and gardening. I ended up with just a book-no seeds, plants, innovative gardening product, etc. Oh well-I enjoyed it anyway. Here are my pictures that came out somewhat clear. I have a new digital camera and an having a hard time getting it to focus.

Here is a link that might be useful: RI flower show pics

Sue thanks for posting the CT flower show pictures. I agree that container with the EE is an interesting one. I am always surprised in the judged portion I often don't like the winner the best! It is fun to read the judges comments and see if you agree or not. The flower 'rugs' are neat.

Terryboc nice photos of RI. Some shots I don't remember seeing. Isn't it funny that that two people can go to a show and take photos and come up with such different shots? I have some photos I'll try to post later.

At RI we enjoyed a talk on Deer Proofing your garden. It concentrated on deer psychology and how you have to constantly change methods to outwit the deer. The lady that gave the talk gardens in the NY area which is even more over run with deer than we are (supposedly). We went to a cooking demonstration also which was kind of fun. All the displays were enjoyable and it is always neat to see and smell some real plants this time of year.

Sue

Thanks for the pictures Terry! Next year I am going to plan to go to the RI show. It's too bad both shows are held on the same weekend. As far as the live displys go, I suspect the variety of plants you can force into bloom in February is fairly limited so I don't expect alot of diversity in that respect but the patio/pond/waterfall/cafe table theme is beyond overdone IMO.

Is anybody here going to the Philly show?

David, there is a guy down in Guilford who has this massive stonehedge thing going on on his waterfront estate. A couple of years ago he was on the Guilford garden tour so we got a nice look at the whole property. The link below tells a bit about it.

Sue

Here is a link that might be useful: Circle of Life

I'm heading to the Philly show and wrapping a visit to my little brother's family into one visit.

I was the designer for the Rhode Island Nursery and Landscape Association's (RINLA) RI Flower Show exhibit both this year and last year. I find this chatter about the flower shows insightful and educational. I had taken the feedback I had read on here last year to heart for the design of this year's plan. I made sure that this year's design was something that the flower show visitors could feasibly do in their yard. My design was the little old garden shed with the artwork, pond with walk through bridge, and spring time theme. I knew there was some frustration that the previous year's exhibits were overblown and way beyond the reality of most of the visitors there.

I almost would like to ask all of you visitors what would you like to see at the flower shows. I will pose the answers to the RINLA Flower Show exhibit committee when we meet next for next year's show (which is coming up soon.)

Terry, you had commented on how the plant material was ordinary and run of the mill. Sue is completely right that we are limited by what is available in February. We get a lot of our flower material from Bay State and Lake Street Garden Center in NH. The woody plant material is donated to us by RINLA members and what can be forced to bloom and/or look decent for the show. Roses, hydrangeas, other summer material, and tropicals would be so cost prohibitive it wouldn't be worth it to bring them in. I had recommended some material my first year that wasn't run of the mill and was shot down by the committee because it would have cost a king's ransom to get it there. Oh well, live and learn.

Sue I am going to the Philly show this year on Thursday 3/8. We are going to be down in Philly attending a traveling King Tut show at the Franklin Institute Science Museum (actually planned the weekend to include the flower show too!). OT: Anyone interested in King Tut artifacts this show is displaying artifacts not seen outside of Egypt and the largest collection ever allowed outside of Egypt -- a once in a lifetime opportunity. See this link:

King Tut Exhibit

After Philly the show travels to London.

Also I put some of my photos of RI in PictureTrail below...

Sue

Here is a link that might be useful: RI Flower Show Photos

Cris,
I didn't mean to sound harsh. I do agree that this early in the year makes it difficult to get a large variety of forced plant material. I will say that for the most part the plant material was fresh and healthy looking at all of the displays. I'm a big fan of Lake Street garden center and I'm always envious of the show organizers who have all of those lovely flats of plants growing there. Was your display the one with the cute puppies on Sunday?

All in all, I thought all of the displays were of very good quality and design. Some I liked better than others, based soley on my design preferences. I always love the japanese maples, and was absolutely drooling over one of the Sangu Kakus there. I'm very jealous of those zone 6ers who can grow them!

I would love to see native granite used in creative ways in future displays. We have so much of it here that I think it would be inspirational to see what we could do with it.
I think water displays are always great as well. Anything with water draws my eye (as you can tell from my photo selection!)