NYBG's 2022 Collectors' Plant Sale and Silent Auction
Spring is a popular time for fairs and sales of all kinds and whenever my busy schedule allows, I always try to catch a few of my favorites.
Yesterday, I attended The New York Botanical Garden's Collectors' Plant Sale and Silent Auction. This event featured hard-to-find trees, shrubs, and plants propagated from NYBG collections, and hand-selected for their rarity, hardiness, and charm. The sale offered something for everyone. It’s a splendid time of year to be at The New York Botanical Garden - not only to enjoy its many fun and interesting events, but to see its stunning horticultural displays. I hope you take the opportunity to visit The NYBG next time you are in the New York City area.
Enjoy these photos.
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- Everything at The New York Botanical Garden is so meticulously maintained. Located on 250 acres, The NYBG is a living museum, an educational institution, and a plant research and conservation organization. I always enjoy visiting and seeing their stunning displays.
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- This Collectors’ Plant Sale and Silent Auction event was held at The Lillian and Amy Goldman Stone Mill building. All proceeds from this sale support the Garden’s internationally important programs in horticulture, botanical research, and children’s education – all central to preserving and protecting the world’s flora.
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- The Garden is an ideal venue for learning about plants and expanding personal botanical collections. The Collectors’ Plant Sale attracted many buyers. Inside, tables are filled with for-sale specimens. NYBG experts were also on-hand to help guests make their selections.
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- All the plants were grouped together by variety and labeled with its characteristics.
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- This moth orchid is called Phalaenopsis Star Green Emerald. It features pale-yellow green flowers and a slightly darker lip. These Phalaenopsis orchids are easy-to-grow and are among the most popular for beginning home orchid growers as well as serious collectors.
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- These are the delicate flowers of Epimedium ‘Raspberry Rhapsody’. I have many Epimediums in my gardens. This one has mauve-rose spurs and pale pink sepals. Its leaves emerge in shades of mahogany-red before turning green in summer.
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- There were also many plants outside on the back terrace. Some with gorgeous lush foliage and others with colorful blooms.
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- This is Picea orienetalis ‘Aurea’ – a moderately fast growing, broadly conical, upright selection of Caucasian spruce. It creates an impressive spring show of creamy yellow new growth that darkens to darker green over the course of the season. I loved it.
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- Chamaecyparis obtusa ‘Marian’ is a dwarf variety of Hinoki cypress with a slow-growth rate and an irregular and interesting shape. Branches have fan-twisted shoots and bright-green colored scales in autumn and gold-yellow in winter.
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- This foliage is from a Thuja plicata ‘Whipcord’ – a dense, multi-stemmed evergreen shrub with finely textured, green foliage, and gracefully arching branches.
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- These beautiful blooms are from Rhododendron ‘Mrs. Nancy Dimple’ – with its large, showy trusses of rose-pink double flowers. It grows to about four to five feet tall and wide.
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- And this is Rhododendron x calendulaceum ‘Tangerine Delight’ – full of large showy clusters of fragrant orange and peach colored flowers.
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- This is Cornus kousa ‘Wolf Eyes’ – a kousa dogwood. It features dramatic foliage with distinct ivory margins. The creamy white flowers are followed by bright red fruits in late summer and then displays leaves in shades of pink and red in autumn.
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- Leucothoe fontanesiana ‘Silver Run’ has white sprays of tiny bell-shaped flowers that bloom in spring.
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- In front of the Stone Mill building is another collection of sale items – stunning hard-to-find trees.
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- During refreshments, CEO and The William C. Steere Sr. President of The New York Botanical Garden, Jennifer Bernstein, took to the podium and welcomed everyone to the sale.
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- The Lillian and Amy Goldman Stone Mill is very historic. It is the oldest existing tobacco manufacturing building in the United States.
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- The Stone Mill was built around 1840 right next to the Bronx River to supplement an earlier building of the same function.
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- The schist, or metamorphic rock, that makes up the building’s walls was quarried locally. Behind the structure is this expansive terrace overlooking the river.
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- On the left is NYBG‘s curator of the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden, Stephen Scanniello, along with Marc Hachadourian, NYBG’s director of the Nolen Greenhouses for Living Collections and the curator of the orchid collection.
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- It’s always fun to attend events like this one with friends. Here I am with Christopher Spitzmiller, my head gardener, Ryan McCallister, and Memrie Lewis.
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- After plants are purchased, NYBG staff members transport them to the front of the Stone Mill where they can be picked up as guests leave. It is a very well-organized event.
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- In the end, I purchased several plants including the Picea orientalis ‘Aurea’, Rhododedron ‘Catawbiense Album’, and Rhododendron prinophyllum ‘Marie Hoffman’. I can’t wait to see these flourish at my farm.
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- On the way out, I also got a couple Iris pseudata ‘Yarai’. When in bloom, this iris has gorgeous soft peach flowers with deep purple veining. This specimen is a Japanese cross between Iris pseudocorus and Iris ensata. These will look so pretty in my flower garden.
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- It was a very enjoyable evening at The New York Botanical Garden – please visit the NYBG when you can and check out its web site for upcoming events.
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