Patrick Blanc’s Gorgeous Vertical Gardens Flank the 10th Annual Orchid Show at NYBG

Spring is here, and the <a href="http://www.nybg.org" target="_blank">New York Botanical Garden</a>’s annual Orchid Show is in full bloom. Now in its tenth year, the show features gorgeous vertical gardens this year, carefully curated by French botanist <a href="http://www.verticalgardenpatrickblanc.com/" target="_blank">Patrick Blanc</a>. The gardens transform the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory into an orchid wonderland, complete with colorful blooms, feathery ferns and exotic plants. Planning to visit the show yourself? Inhabitat readers get <strong>20% off admission</strong> - click through for details!

Patrick Blanc is both a botanist and an artist, bringing his creativity to the design of the current Orchid Show. With his matching bright green hair, the artist brought the show to a new level, by defying gravity with his vertical gardens.

Eight foot tall canvases are used as the picture plane, with colorful orchids, ferns, exotic plants, and epiphytes as the artist’s medium, planted together to form compositions with bursts of colors stretching in each direction.

A detail shot of one of Blanc's vertical gardens. <em>Image via <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/boscdanjou/6910731732/">Posc d'Anjou Flickr</a></em>

Oversized cubes, reaching 13 feet, are also used to create three <a href="http://inhabitat.com/nyc/photos-we-take-a-stroll-up-the-queens-botanical-gardens-sloping-green-roof/" target="_blank">dimensional gardens</a>, challenging both the plants used and the space to become a garden outside of the box.

To view the flowers without a crowd, consider attending one of the NYBG's <a href="http://www.nybg.org/exhibitions/2012/orchid-show/evenings.php">Orchid Evenings</a>, with DJs and a cash bar. <em>Image via <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/keroism/6913465742/in/photostream/">keroism</a> Flickr</em>

Kalihi butterfly orchids decorate an eight x sixteen foot <a href="http://inhabitat.com/verdmx-vertical-gardens-in-mexico/" target="_blank">garden wall</a>, welcoming visitors to venture inside the orchid wonderland.

The colorful orchid blooms pop on the beds of epiphytes beneath them, which fill out the vertical living walls.

The show, which runs through April 22, has also been host to many orchid related events, including <a href="http://inhabitat.com/7-indoor-plants-that-purify-the-air-around-you-naturally/" target="_blank">caring for your own orchids at home</a>, as well informative orchid history and highlights on different strains of the flower.

<em>Image via <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/boscdanjou/6910731732/">Posc d'Anjou Flickr</a></em>