phipps

The time to visit Phipps is in the winter, when the snow is on the ground, and the wind howls, and you are chilled to the bone and beginning to think grumpy, evil thoughts about living in a temperate zone. That's the time to go! A 20 minute drive from the South Hills and you can put all that snow and cold behind you!

Enter, remove your coats, hats, gloves, and enter another world! The Palm Court, which is the central space of the conservatory, with high glass ceilings and full size palms, acts as the entry way to the 12 other areas. A map is provided, and a traffic flow strongly suggested (in a counter clockwise direction).

The serpentine room, with it's undulating brick walk, usually has current floral displays, and it leads into the fern room, another tall ceilinged room, distinctly tropical. It is the entryway to my two favorite rooms:

The Orchid Room, long and narrow with a streamlet running down the center. In the stream, large koi, on either side and hanging over it are tropical trees, bromiliads, orchids, and all hanging with Spanish Moss. You could lose yourself in this room, dark and mysterious, heavy air, perfumed. The sounds of birds are piped in; they are not really there.

And on the other side of the Fern Room is what the people at Phipps call the "stove room". Perhaps it once had a stove in it. Now, it has a tunnel and bridge, so you walk a lazy 8 path, over, around and under. The trees, the foliage, are thick and lush. In the spring, the conservatory will import butterflies, and they will live in the stove room.

In the tropical fruit and spice room, a banana. Big and beautiful and bountiful. Just look it the fat bananas!

I came to the Phipps to get out of the cold, and to ask a horticulturist about my banana flower. I was in luck! It was a weekday, and quiet, and the horticulturist had time to stop and talk. I told him about my banana tree, how first the baby bananas came out finger size, but now they were coming out barely as long as my nail ---
"What is happening is perfectly normal" he told me. The first flowers are female, but they don't have to be pollinated to produce the little bananas, which are what you see. Then come the male flowers, they cannot produce bananas, and they will dry up and fall off. "
"It can take as much as 9 months for the bananas to develop into edible size. It all depends upon how much sunlight the plant receives." I had to admit that mine received very little. "And temperature -- don't let it get below 55 degrees. The plants can't tolerate that. If your greenhouse drops below 55 (it does. Damn this temperate zone living!) get some of those heating cables sold to warm seed starters, and wrap them around the pots."
I promised him I would do just that.

We went on to other rooms. The Japanese Garden, the Broderie with herbs planted in knot designs, the Desert Room. And in the South Conservatory, the Christmas Trains were still running. One of my friends, Carl, is a train enthusiast, and has created a page about the trains in the Phipps Conservatory, with wonderful pictures and plenty of hard information. You can see his work at www.pgh.net/~carendt/trains.html .
Alas, all good afternoons come to an end. We returned to our coats, to winter and the harsh realities of life.