Fern Fever: The Story of Pteridomania - Victorian Terrarium Craze

Bell jar style terrarium ad, from the
book "Fern Fever"

Collecting ferns and moss was quite the fashion for the Victorians, so much so that one might have called it an obsession.  Fern enthusiasts traded and promenaded their fantastical ferns, going as far as making treks out to the wild to collect rare specimens.  An over-enthusiastic, fern-seeker even tumbled to her death while reaching for an elusive cliff-dwelling specimen.

Sarah Whittingham traces this phenomenon in her glossy book "Fern Fever: The Story of Pteridomania."  Jam packed with lush photos of ferneries, fern grotto gardens, and decorative arts graced with fern fronds, she forms an overwhelming set of evidence for the Victorian fern fever, or pteridomania.

Interestingly enough, young women embraced fern fever the most avidly of all Victorians.  Much like the pop star-crazed tweens of today, Victorian teens were engrossed in trading fern specimen collector cards and begging their parents to install fern grottoes in their basements.  Even the daughter of novelist Charles Dickens developed mild pteriodomania.

An excerpt from the book:

The novelist Charles Dickens was sometimes irritated by his daughter Mary's lack of vigour and purpose in life.  In 1862 he wrote to a friend to whom Mary (then aged 24) had expressed a wish for some ferns to plant in their home: 

"After careful cross examining my daughter . . . I do NOT believe her to be worthy of the fernery . . . When I ask her where she would have the fernery and what she would do with it, the witness falters, turns pale, becomes confused, and says: 'Perhaps it would be better not to have it at all."

"Fern Fever: The Story of Pteridomania"
by Sarah Whittingham

Gosh, Dickens.  Maybe if you hadn't bullied your daughter over it you could have both enjoyed an entrancing fern grotto.  Of course the ferns did hold a sort of "fantastical" fascination for many Victorians.  Some enthusiasts connected ferns with faeries and fantasy, while others touted it as a healthy study of natural science and a great family activity to fern hunt in the countryside on a weekend.  Clever folks published lucrative fern field guides; stuffy folk formed formal fern societies and journals.

Incidentally, all these ferns necessitated all sorts of fern cases, aquariums, terrariums and other methods of constructing suitable environments for the precious and often costly fern specimens.  I share a few copies of the advertisements for Victorian fern cases from the book.

Paula Hayes at Meijer Gardens

If you live in the Grand Rapids area, you can catch a lecture from Paula Hayes, renowned artists and sculptor known for her work with terrariums at Meijer Gardens tonight.  If you aren't in the area, thanks to Meijer Gardens for bringing this awesome video to my attention.  Paula Hayes shares the story behind her 2010 terrarium installation work at MOMA NY.

Paula Hayes Book



Paula Hayes book, available at amazon.com

Paula Hayes' legendary terraria have graced the galleries of some of the finest art institutions worldwide, elevating the craft of terrarium-making into a recognized art form.  Her tempered and thoughtful arrangements have been the source of much discussion here at the F&M.  Images of her work is now commemorated in a book, available at amazon.

Artist Paula Hayes has participated in over 65 group exhibitions since 1990, and has been the subject of over 15 solo exhibitions at prestigious institutions and galleries such as the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, the Marianne Boesky Gallery, Jeanne Greenburg-Rohatyn's Salon 94, and, most recently, the Museum of Modern Art in New York. She has received wide critical acclaim from prominent art publications such as Art in America, Artforum, Sculpture Magazine, the New Art Examiner, and from critics including Barry Schwabsky. Hayes lectures widely and believes strongly in sharing her knowledge with future generations of artists. She has been a visiting instructor at Skidmore College, the School of Visual Arts, the Cooper Union, the University of Wisconsin, Middlebury College, New York University, and the Cranbrook Academy of Art, among others. Hayes recently developed a line of Living Necklaces—air plants that can be worn as jewelry, which are sold at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. She designed new gardens for the W Hotel in South Beach, Florida, and launched a line of biomorphic-shaped tableware in May 2010.

Practical Terrariums at CityDirt.net

If your gardening habits extend beyond the miniature and the glass-enclosed you may be thinking about starting spring seedlings for your garden. Maria at CityDirt.net would like to remind you that terrariums and bell-jar arrangements are a great way to start seeds!

If you live in a small space and the seedlings are visible, grow them in something that looks nice. When cultivating small amounts of salad greens indoors use Edwardian terrariums made of glass and metal or a large cloche with saucer. They have the same greenhouse effect as the plastic kits, yet look nice in your living space. Salad greens grow quickly from seeds and starts work even for the impatient gardener. Herbs, especially the woodier ones like rosemary, are much more slow growing and so it's worth it to just buy them as starts.

For smaller starts, get very small, clean terra cotta planters with drainage holes in the bottom. Fill them with good potting soil and plant a few seeds in each one. To intensify the heat and light, put them under a cloche, or a bell shaped glass, or inside a glass terrarium. This will also look very nice and could go in the center of a table if it's in a sunny spot. Keep the seedlings moist. When they start to sprout, remove the glass cover. If there are too many plants growing up against each other, cull out the spindlier ones. After each plant has a few leaves, fertilize them with worm castings.

If they are going to be outdoor plants, they will need to be hardened off, so put them outside on mild days, and bring them back in at night. Do this for a few weeks, and then transplant them into your window box.

Save your cloche, terrarium and small terra cotta containers for the next round of seeds or plant small, tropical houseplants in the pots and keep them under the glass as a centerpiece.

This is excerpted from A Little Piece of Earth, How To Grow Your Own Food in Small Spaces published by Rizzoli Books, Feb. 16th, 2010.

CityDirt.net

Charley Harper Posters and More

Yesterday I came across an amazing coffee-table type art book of the art and graphic design of Charley Harper! This may be old hat for ya'll but I had never seen his work before but I instantly recognized the style as something I grew up seeing in older design motifs that I have always been very drawn towards. I love the bold graphic design elements and the modernist accents.

I particularly love his environmentally-aware subjects and natural history/biology work - especially the ocean themed ones. He stays true to his animal subjects like a naturalist but still manages to imbue the creatures with verve and personality. I love the National Parks posters he did as well.

He also did some advertising work and some in-house stuff for Ford that seemed to be focused on Americana and heritage-type subjects. All fantastic. All great stuff. I now have a new holy grail for thrift-store book shopping.

If you haven't seen these before take a spin around the website- they are really great.

http://www.charleyharperprints.com/

A tip for adding plants to bottle terrariums

Check out this great tip from the Sunset Terrarium bookon how to roll up the root ball of a plant to add it to a bottle terrarium. This is a great trick to enable you to add plants with developed root systems cleanly into a terrarium. I just use some scrap newspaper to roll up the root ball into a nice cone or tube shape.

Now go add some big plants to your bottle terrariums!

Tools for Terrarium Maintenance

From Terrariums & Miniature Gardens (Sunset Books)

Climate Management in Terrariums

This is an excellent illustration of a healthy ecosystem created in a terrarium that has a small open top. The air will circulate more in an open-t than in a closed-top terrarium and the water cycle circulates nicely.

The Sunset Terrarium Book

The New Terrarium by Tovah Martin

They had a copy of the book The New Terrarium by Tovah Martin at the shop at Lotusland. I flipped through it and it had some beautiful photos of plants under bell jars and wardian cases. These all looked like the very pruned variety of terrariums and also larger scale ones- and I am more interested in the micros. I may pick up a used copy though!

The 1970s Sunset Gardening Terrarium book

I ordered this book used off amazon as it is out of print. I grew up reading Sunset garden books my parents had around and I love all the funky 70s photos. This book has some helpful tips but the photos of the plants best suited for terrariums are all in black and white and difficult to indentify.