Not since the likes of Audrey II in Little Shop of Horrors has their been a botanical diva like Lois, the Corpse Flower, in Houston. One might call her the Snooki of the plant world, with a giant poof and an attitude even stronger than her smell.
We chat with Lois, who gained her fame with her stink and her Twitter stream last year, about how life—now that her 15-minutes of fame is over—has been treating her. We discover that this Titan arum has still got her groove on.
A look at some of the new lily hybrids available for the bulb and cut flower market.
A look at the wallpapers and the Brooklyn studio (including a rooftop garden) of Flavor Paper, a hand-screened and digital wallpaper company.
Photos of English garden designer Sarah Price's gardens, including her 2007 RHS Chelsea Flower Show entry, "A City Garden," with detailed plant photos, as well as a sketch of Price's plans for her entry in this year's Chelsea Flower Show.
Passion flowers are blooming! A genus of about 500 species of vines (and the occasional shrub),
Passiflora flowers are distinguished by a characteristic design of radiating filaments and multi-leveled structure. They've long fascinated botanists, gardeners, and even theologians. We've designed a brief primer of several common features—the flower's morphology, and how it gave the plant its name.
Solenostemon 'Chocolate Mint' is a rich new coleus with mahogany velvet leaves edged in chartreuse.
Lilac blue with a cream face, deep-purple blotch and clutch of whiskers, Viola Sorbet Marina Babyface is sweet beyond belief, and fragrant too. Forms a mound 6 inches high and up to 10 inches across; flowers are an inch or more wide. Very frost tolerant.
Many botanical gardens and even city parks show off plantings of mums in the fall, so be sure to check on locations close to home. Some places go above and beyond to create eye-popping displays, such as the chrysanthemum festivals at Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania (Nov 1-21), Bellingrath Gardens and Home in Theodore, Alabama (Nov 12-25), and the Portland Japanese Garden in Oregon (Oct 9-17). The National Chrysanthemum Society also hosts an annual show (this year at Sherman Library and Gardens, Corona del Mar, California, Oct 30-31), and local chapters put on smaller shows across the country; visit mums.org to learn more. But if your love of mums can lure you across the Atlantic, then the Chrysanthema Lahr festival in Lahr, Germany, is a can’t-miss event, held from Oct 16-Nov 7 this year.
In suburban New York, a reader grows tiers of organic vegetables that connect to a Craftsman-style house via a bridge.
Four shade-friendly plants that thrive in Los Angeles and that add color and texture to the garden.
