A troubling economy, Going Green and Slow Food are some concepts and realities in the new world paradigm, but they signal a return to roots and more basic, honest values including nature, gardens and family.
Here are two public gardens and a public arboretum all decked out for your family's pleasure and centrally located in DIG IT! Territory, too, in New York City – each well worth the trip.
Holiday Train Show at The New York Botanical Garden, Now – January 10
The Holiday Train Show in the Victorian-style Enid A. Haupt Conservatory beckons visitors to enter a magical world under glass brimming with history and enchantment. Here among an acre of plants, large-gauge model trains and trolleys chug past skyscrapers, museums, mansions, brownstones, bridges, ballparks, and more than 100 replicas of New York landmarks including the Statue of Liberty, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Brooklyn Bridge, Yankee Stadium, and Radio City Music Hall – all created from plant parts such as bark, moss, twigs, berries, and cones.
This year, the original Pennsylvania Station (1910–1964) makes its debut. The 20-square foot replica features the “Grand Concourse” and a cutaway view to train tracks beneath the station with a shuttling passenger train. A rendition of the iconic Brooks Brothers flagship on Madison Avenue, the first clothing retailer in the country, is also new to this 18th annual show. Trains include 1800s American steam engines, streetcars, whimsical ladybugs, circus cars, modern freight and high-speed passenger trains.
Don’t forget the kids! A gingerbread jazz band, ice skaters, and a farmer are among the colorful characters providing a festive atmosphere as participants also plant up wheat seeds, develop field research notebooks, and decorate their own gingersnap cookies in the Gingerbread Adventures program. See puppet shows and get photos of your kids with Thomas the Tank Engine™.
New York Botanical garden: www.nybg.org
Holiday Celebration, Old Westbury Gardens, December 5 - 20
Westbury House at Old Westbury Gardens on Long Island, New York, is the former home of J.S. Phipps, his wife Margarita Grace Phipps and their four children. Despite being a magnificent, 44-room, Charles the Second-style mansion filled with priceless antiques, furnishings and art, the house is sometimes under-appreciated during the warmer months, since the surrounding 200 acres, which include world-renowned gardens, are so spectacular. But the house truly takes over as the star of the show during the Annual Holiday Celebration.
Each room is festively decorated by talented horticulture and house staff using, as much as possible, natural materials founds on the grounds or purchased at local nurseries. Events include children’s crafts (including making ornaments and holiday cards), concerts, a dramatic reading of A Christmas Carol, visits with Santa, a marionette show featuring hand-crafted 19th-century puppets, a fairy tale evening, teas and tours, and much more. Enjoy cookies and cider on our glass-enclosed West Porch. Old Westbury Gardens is the site of many movies and TV shows.
Old Westbury Gardens: www.oldwestburygardens.org
An Elizabethan Banquet, Planting Fields Arboretum State Historic Park, Now – January 3
This Holiday Season, the exhibition, An Elizabethan Banquet, takes place in Coe Hall, the Elizabethan Revival-style Gold Coast mansion in Oyster Bay, Long Island. On display: Cate Blanchett’s actual costumes (lent by Universal Studios) that she wore as Queen Elizabeth 1st in the movie, Elizabeth: The Golden Age. Queen Elizabeth wore clothes with masses of jewels, feathers and embroidery. Elizabeth: The Golden Age shows continuously in Coe Hall.
The costumes are part of The Elizabethan Banquet studded with gold cups, great platters and salt cellars made from thrift store purchases and dollar store artifacts. The Great Hall has been transformed into a grand Renaissance banquet chamber. Elaborate gold and silver displays, typical of royal occasions 400 years ago, were recreated using over 300 decorative objects made from dollar store and thrift store remnants. Used toys, discarded vases, old stands for table lamps, and even part of a truck tire were imaginatively combined to look like a 1600s’ royal banquet. Miniature winged horses and mechanical singing birds of the type first made by in 16th-century goldsmiths for dining room tables.
Henry B. Joyce, Executive Director of Planting Fields Foundation and specialist in English gold and silver-gilt history, created the exhibition. The Great Hall display interprets history by bringing it to life. Take a visit back in Elizabethan time.
Planting Fields Arboretum: www.plantingfields.org
Photos courtesy The New York Botanical Garden, Old Westbury Gardens, Planting Fields Arboretum
**Main photo: Main Greenhouse at Planting Fields Arboretum
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