Canada ought to be proud of its world class flower and garden show. The Garden Club of Toronto and Landscape Ontario are proud of Canada Blooms, an annual event which just got started in 1997, drawing an unprecedented 70,000 visitors to the first show. This year it takes place March 22 to 26. Ticket and contact information is available through ICanGarden.com.
I became acquainted with this prestigious event through a landscape architect friend who has volunteered many hours each year to install one of the feature gardens. The overall effect has been breathtaking. During four days ahead of the show, entire landscapes spring from the concrete floor of the Metro Toronto Convention Centre South. Cobbled walkways are laid down, arbors and stone walls erected, and living plants dug into beds of potting soil: everything from daffodils to orchids to clematis vines and magnolia trees forced into early bloom.
Of all the displays during the past two years, my favourite was Royal Botanical Gardens' 1998 feature. Award-winning landscape architect Ann Milovsoroff designed a spring woodland, complete with paper birches just beginning to leaf out. Strolling through this sublime sanctuary, I almost forgot the close proximity of 20,000 other garden enthusiasts.
Ms. Milovsoroff has designed many of RBG's display gardens and natural areas. Among these is the Mediterranean greenhouse, a collection of colourful plants from chaparral ecosystems around the world, which experience arid summers and cool, wet winters. This type of vegetation is important in the Mediterranean Basin, coastal California, South Africa, Chile and Western Australia.
Having seen both her display and show gardens, I feel Ms. Milovsoroff is one of the bright stars of Canada's contemporary landscape design. Canada Blooms is worth the visit even to view a few displays of this calibre.
Last year I had the privilege of helping my friend, Martin Wade, install the display for Canadian Gardening magazine. He and all of the suppliers and contractors donate their time and products for the show. It is an opportunity to advertise, and also to contribute to creating a thing of ephemeral grandeur.
The most elaborate of parks evolves indoors over a matter of hours. There is no guarantee this flowering crab will open at the right time, or stay attractive in the makeshift indoor environment. If someone forgets to water the bedding plants and they look a little desiccated, the landscaper just has to make do.
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