This year's F&G Show is definitely worth the price and the trip. The seminars have been moved into huge new rooms, so no more tickets or lines - you can just walk right in to hear the speakers.
The display gardens are the best in years. Some are filled with exciting ideas and innovative solutions to garden dilemmas, like the "Best in Show" garden by Karen Stefonick Design called "A Wrinkle In Time" (left), that features a clever way to deal with a conifer backdrop.
Hey, it's worth going just to moon about over the white wisteria and delphinium blooming in Christiansons Nursery's garden - such a delightfully orchestrated dream of summer on a cold February day.
And you'll marvel over a clever little garden created as a student project by 17 year old Courtney Goetz of Gig Harbor. The garden shed is a shipping carton with greenhouse atop to soak up the sun; and the entry fence is made of funky old registers painted green (below). The effect is charming, simple and original...
The best energy at the show is in the far back corner of the Plant Market where the Seattle Children's PlayGarden has set up the most fabulous spot for kids to mess about with wheelbarrows, dirt, water and vegetables...there's even a big tractor to "drive". I loved watching kids pick up potatoes from a huge pile and trundle them about....this exhibit should be up front and center next year so we can all enjoy watching a future generation of gardeners having so much fun. Congratulations to Wendy Welch, Liz Bullard and the Seattle Children's PlayGarden for creating the most thoroughy enjoyed exhibit at the show!
Some of the commercial booths are so impressive - check out the rustic structures made of recycled wood, and the chocolate-schented candles at Chocolate Flower Farm from Whidbey Island (left). They have the only chicken I could find in the entire Convention Center...
Ravenna Gardens is the place to buy gorgeous, long-stemmed pussywillows and enjoy owner Gillian Mathew's color artistry - isn't this booth gorgeous?
Garden Shows are performance art, and it'll all be over by late Sunday afternoon.....
