Set on twenty-five acres adjacent to Rock Creek Park, Hillwood’s gardens feature a diverse and fascinating array of trees, shrubs and herbaceous plants, offering something to see in every season. 

Plants to note in the gardens:

• We are in the last days of chrysanthemum season. Two thousand three hundred mums were added to the gardens in September along with thousands of other cool season annuals like violas, kale and millet. The yellow mums ('Avalon Sunny Yellow') at the motor court are so bright that you may want to break out your sunglasses. As the mums fade, spring bulb planting will begin. Staff and volunteers will be installing over twenty-three thousand bulbs for a lovely spring display.
• Blue wood asters (Symphyotrichum cordifolium) are still providing late season nectar for our pollinators down in the native garden. Light blue, daisy-like flowers with yellow centers develop into panicles along a central stem. As the flower ages, the center can take on a purple hue. As this Mid-Atlantic native often grows to four feet tall, it works well as a middle or back of bed perennial. To maintain form and reduce staking, asters can be pruned back by 2/3 in early summer to keep them compact. 
• As you head to the Merriweather Café, there is a lovely fall-blooming camellia (Camellia sasanqua) next to Merriweather To-Go. This large, evergreen shrub is full of bright pink flowers with yellow centers. It is perfectly situated under the spruce tree for DC’s volatile climate, receiving shade during the summer and protection during the winter. Though climate change and improved breeding have lessened the concerns of cold damage to camellias, at one time, Hillwood gardeners would dig them up and store them in the Dina Merrill Pavilion until spring. 

Highlights in the greenhouse:

• It seems like the greenhouses are already gearing up for Orchid month in March with numerous orchids coming into bloom. Make sure to note an interesting vanda hybrid (Perreiraara Motes Leprechaun x Vanda coerulescens) hanging in the entrance house. Though the flowers are a lovely lavender color with a dark purple lip, it is the scent of grape soda that really puts it over the top. Plants often use fragrance to draw in pollinators and this is certainly a hit with humans.
• Our own award-winning dendrobium orchid (Dendrobium Specio-kingianum ‘Memoria Nina Sue’) has come into flower in the cymbidium house. Though smaller in stature than other dendrobiums in our collection, it packs a punch with lots of unique magenta-colored flowers. The strong upright canes on the plant are an adaptation for water storage. Specio-kingianum is a hybrid of two species native to Australia, Dendrobium kingianum and Dendrobium speciosum.
• Orchid flowers can come in many forms and a very fascinating flower is the spider orchid (Brassidium Gilded Urchin 'Halo'). The long petals and sepals look like spider legs with the flat lip and column serving as the body. The form is believed to attract pollinators. The flower lures in spider-hunting wasps that then come in contact and spread its pollen. Gilded Urchin ‘Halo’ was developed by crossing two different genera (Brassia and Oncidium) from the western hemisphere.