It seems hard to believe, but the holidays really are just around the corner. We love the holidays here at The New York Botanical Garden. The holidays mean the return of one of New York City’s most cherished family traditions,The Holiday Train Show in the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory. It also means the arrival of beautiful new goodies at the Shop in the Garden, and on the Shop’s website. The selection of gifts in the Shop this holiday season is all about favorites, but they’re not just ours. We’re inviting some of the Garden’s most stylish, culinarily-minded, crafty, and green-thumbed friends to share a few of their favorite things with you!
So, take a spin around the Shop, whether in person while you’re visiting the giant pumpkins this weekend, or virtually. And if you happen to spot something that you’d like to call your favorite, you can use the “Tell A Friend” feature to give Santa a gentle hint.
So watch this space to see what some of your favorite bloggers will be giving as gifts this holiday season!
In the meantime, here are a few of my favorite things.
What will the pumpkin end up looking like, and will Cully break his own World Record? Only time will tell. But we do love daydreaming here at the Garden. So to get your imagination going about what the great pumpkin might end up looking like, we thought we’d share a few pictures of Cully’s past creations.
Learn more about the giant pumpkins here, here, and here. And to plan your visit for this fascinating Garden experience, click here.
Anyone who thinks Halloween Hoorah—The New York Botanical Garden‘s annual celebration of all things Halloween and pumpkin–is just for kids clearly did not see the look on my fiancé’s face on a recent Saturday. Maybe it was the generous wine samples we had just enjoyed at the Edible Garden’s finale weekend, or maybe it had to do with the fact that she’s been bringing up having children more often, and more insistently. Either way, her expression of delight as we walked through the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden was unreservedly enthusiastic, and, to a man who has been dealing with the daily headaches of having just moved into a fourth-floor walk-up, this change in mood was entirely welcome.
The pumpkin, grown by Chris Stevens in New Richmond, Wisconsin weighs 1,810 1/2 pounds. It will be on display at The New York Botanical Garden through Halloween along with two other giant pumpkins. The second weightiest of the group (shown at right) clocks in at 1,725 pounds and was grown by Ken Sweet in Washington, Michigan. The third gourd in the giant pumpkin trio was grown by Steve Connolly in Sharon, Massachusetts and weighs 1,674 1/2 pounds.
Pictures cannot convey how impressive these amazing, sustainably-grown ‘Atlantic Giants’ are. So come see them for yourself! The pumpkins will be on display around the reflecting pool at the Leon Levy Visitor Center through Sunday, October 31.
On Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, October 29, 30, and 31 renowned pumpkin carver Steve Cully will be at the Botanical Garden to carve the record-setting gourd. Cully will attempt to break the Guinness World Record for the Largest Jack ‘O Lantern which he already holds!
To plan your visit and learn more about the pumpkins and the Garden, click here. And for eleven fun facts we learned about giant pumpkins from the growers themselves, click here.
Here are some fun facts I learned about giant pumpkins from the farmers that grow them.
– During peak growth, the pumpkins can add as much as 50 pounds of weight per day.
– The pale color of the pumpkins has been genetically selected for because the farmers think it looks nice. The pale salmon color also contains tinge of blue that highlights the genetic heritage of the Blue Hubbard squash.
Rustin Dwyer is Visual Media Production Specialist at The New York Botanical Garden.
What makes a good olive oil? What’s the deal with whole wheat pasta? How much should I pay?
The “Master of Molto Gusto” paid us a visit last weekend and took time to answer all these questions and more. Here are some amazing images from last weekend’s event, so check it out if you missed it . . .
There may be two rides; a leisurely 25-mile ride for all ages and skill levels, and a more athletic ride that clocks in at 40 miles, but both end at the Botanical Garden.
The first of three giant pumpkins that will call The New York Botanical Garden home through Halloween (as part of Halloween Hoorah) arrived today. And what an arrival it was! The 1,725 pound beauty was grown by farmer Ken Sweet in Michigan–40 miles north of Detroit on the border of the towns of Romeo and Armada–and was driven here by his two buddies Don van Houtte and Mark Mikula. The two men set out yesterday, stopped in Pennsylvania for a rest and arrived behind the Conservatory around 11 a.m. They were greeted by a small fleet of golf carts bringing smiling Garden employees, and one very large forklift.
After a few photo ops with the employees, the giant pumpkin was lifted gently from its truck by the forklift, and carried in a caravan of golf carts to its resting spot by the reflecting pool in front of the Leon Levy Visitors Center where it will shortly be joined by two pumpkin buddies, including the new world record holder, a behemoth weighing in at 1,800 pounds!
All the old favorites will be here: the original Yankee Stadium, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Belvedere Castle, Pennsylvania Station. But there always has to be something new under the glittering dome of the Conservatory!
So this year the Botanical Garden and the workshop of Applied Imagination are adding some planes to our trains with the iconic Eero Saarinen-designed Trans World Airlines Flight Center at John F. Kennedy International Airport. The modernist masterpiece (now known as JetBlue’s Terminal 5) comes complete with tarmac, runway, and several airplanes including the Concorde.
New York state’s largest free bicycle tour, 