If you listen really carefully right about *now*, you'll hear the sound of a thousand bloggers and Instagrammers slapping on their lippy and heading to a certain botanical gardens for their latest photo shoot.
I am of course talking about Kew Gardens, which has just launched its annual Orchids Festival in the Princess of Wales Conservatory.
The absolute highlight (although strictly off-limits for those close-up selfies) is the floating installation on the pond, which features 600 individual orchids and depicts Thailand's Bang Pa-In Palace:
Orchids grow up pillars and across pathways, and even hang from the ceiling:
It's absolutely stunning, composed of almost 7,000 individual orchids, but as well as showcasing the flowers, the festival is a celebration of Thai culture.
 |
| Can I get some blogger points for matching my nail varnish to the flowers? |
Fun fact: five water dragons live permanently in the conservatory to keep unwanted insects in check. They're notoriously difficult to spot - especially when a herd of scoop-hungry press photographers is stomping about all over the place - so I wasn't lucky enough to see them this time.
A word of warning: the festival is inside a tropical conservatory, so things get hot and steamy. I left my house in -3° to get to the press preview, wrapped up to the extreme, which resulted in much sweating on arrival. It also meant that camera lenses were steaming up left, right and centre hence the less-than-ideal quality of some of these pictures. But, this does mean it makes for an excellent day out in these cold winter months.
Orchids Festival at Kew Gardens, 10 February-11 March 2018. Entry to the festival is included in a general admission ticket.
No comments:
Post a Comment