Phipps Conservatory is a fantastic little Pittsburgh gem in Schenley Park where you can go to see an amazing collection of plants and flowers. I know it may not sound all that interesting, but I assure you, Phipps is more than just an average public garden, and when we visited it this year, I saw even how much more it had become.
It had been almost ten years since I was last at Phipps. Pitt had one Monday holiday each semester, and the bio classes would cancel labs for the whole week and instead send you off on an ‘out of the lab’ project. One was at the Carnegie Museum, and the other was at Phipps. So way back in the fall of 2001 was the last time I’d been to Phipps, and, yet again, this was something Michael had never seen. What I didn’t realize was that seeing it for me would be like seeing it for the first time as well.
In the past few years, Phipps has expanded so very much, and they do different features each year and retain a few pieces of each feature artfully incorporated into the overall design of the place. This year, however, the theme was ‘Gothic Meets Gorgeous: Gargoyles in the Garden.’
I am batsh*t crazy about gargoyles.
This is one of those things I’ve always been in love with, and I have quite a few little protectors scattered throughout our house. Naturally, I couldn’t miss the gargoyle show at Phipps, so we headed out on a beautiful afternoon for the event.
Phipps from our parking space across the street. Much of this front has been added in the past few years as the gardens expanded.
This little guy is the star of all the billboards and signs for the installation, and he reminds me of Hoggle from Labyrinth.
Of course, this trip was a great excuse for us to test out our manual focus and macro function on the camera. 🙂 If anyone can identify these flowers, please let me know so I can include their names.
Flowers in one of the outside gardens.
A little tree gargoyle trying to escape up the rocky wall in the Amazon section of the conservatory.
Us by the waterfall in the Amazon section. This part of the conservatory is really like walking into the rain forest. It was so neat!
This is the labyrinth garden, which we of course loved. You can have your wedding at Phipps, and I can imagine all the incredible wedding pictures you would be able to get!
These amazing gargoyles were made with sticks from the trees that fell during our winter storms in Pittsburgh. I just thought they were beautiful!
This is the entryway to the Conservatory. A few seasons ago, their exhibition was all glass art, and this is one of the pieces of that show that remain.
Sarris Candy, the local (most delicious ever) candy company made special gargoyle-shaped chocolates for Phipps, and we just had to try one.
The ad for the show, seen as we were driving away from the Conservatory.