This year's Vancouver Sun Garden Show, formerly known as the Vandusen Garden Show was greatly anticipated as last year's show was cancelled. I had never exhibited at this show before but had attended 2 years ago when the show organisers took the focus back to gardening and created a great show in 2005. The garden loving public had very strong opinions about the show so I recieved mixed reactions when I spoke of my involvement. My curiosity grew as the event date approached and I was very optimistic that this show would be great.

The community of exhibitors was fun to get to know during the load in/set up as well as through the course of the show. In fact I knew a lot of people already as I encouraged the participation of The Garden Design Group for this show and we set up a table in the Horticultural Groups section. There were also members of our group who had their own exhibits in the deck display area as well as my preferred landscape installer Steve Jones, of Urban Escapes . I was definately in good company.

I exhibited my Urban Deck Display with Art Knapp, The Urban Garden and created: “Snuggle – An Intimate Space for Two”

"The city of Vancouver is a "window on the world", home to many people from all over the globe. We love stylish, urban homes and enjoy a strong quality of life. Garden spaces give us a private retreat to enjoy caring for and growing plants, but most importantly to share a quiet moment with our loved ones. Many urban gardeners have little outside space to work with and struggle to fit all their "garden" items within it. They often forget to leave space for themselves. Maximize your private time by making you and your loved ones a top priority in your intimate space."

We had a great response to our display. People really enjoyed the vibrant colour combination of the flowers against the warm neutral browns of the pots, furniture and accessories. We worked with Living Space furniture for the display and they kindly let us use their Richard Schultz 2 seater (gorgeous!) and the great space divider Stix. Pierre did his magic with the final touches and dressed the space beatifully with accessories.

Unfortunately the weather was definately NOT on our side and the weekend of the show was mostly filled with pouring rain. Big disappointment for attendance as some people will only come out if the weather is alright. The exhibitors commiserated with each other and really made an effort to stay with their booths and answer questions for the brave souls that did show up. I don't regret my participation with the show because every event offers something valuable but it was definately challenging to be stuck in the rain!

posted on December 19th , 2007