We started over twenty years ago with ten Tillandsias. We lost nine of them, one by one, trying to grow them inside, in moderate to low light, with occasional misting. None of them ever bloomed.
As time went on, we got more. And then more; as many as thirty genera. Finally, they were on every shelf, every table, and standing along many of the walls. It became apparent that we needed some kind of place to keep them or we would have to move out ourselves.
I talked it over with my wife, Sauny, and we decided a "normal" greenhouse just wasn't "us". We've always admired those magnificent, multifaceted iron and glass Victorian conservatories. We have neither the acres of land or the acres of money needed to build one of these. So we did what we could.
It would be glass. Rough, full dimension redwood would be the frame and we would build our own windows. It became 17' by 17' and 13' high at the highest point. There had to be resistance to twisting. That reinforcement is usually taken care of by using diagonals. To avoid using them, the main vertical supports became redwood 4 x 4's three feet apart (3' 4" between centers). Four feet above this are 3' redwood 2 x 4's giving window spaces 36" x 48".
Redwood 1 x 6's were split for the outer frames of the windows and 1 x 2's were used for the muntins and mullions. We made 31 interchangeable windows with nine lights each. Special ones were made to take care of the panels that were not 36" x 48".
We put a thermostat-controlled fan high on the downwind wall. Plexiglas windows were used in the homemade door. The instructions with the cool air inlet louvers said to mount them at floor level. That didn't make sense to me as it would encourage temperature stratification. So I mounted them on the the side opposite the exit fan.
The floor is pebbles. Someday we may deck it with redwood. Meanwhile, it is a great place forCryptanthus. One of these days I'm going to put them in the ground.
If anyone is wondering, I managed to plan most of this on paper. I took it to the City Planning Department to get a permit. Surprise! It was approved with very little change. Their changes were important and useful.
One of the 36" by 48" window assemblies on the windward side is mounted using brass screws in the middle if the top and the bottom, allowing the panel to swivel. This construction will add a lot of cool air fast on hot days.
A rough redwood 2" x 12" shelf was bolted on the inside about seven feet up, just above the first tier of windows. It stiffens the whole structure and gives a nice set of display shelves. Sauny found a number of 16" x 47" glass shelves that became available when a downtown store decided to quit. They are mounted with redwood supports and give shelves without shading the area beneath them.
The main benches are about 28" up from the floor and about 24" deep. They are built of rough redwood 2" x 4"'s covered with hardware cloth, and a second layer of small hogwire. They are supported from beneath with 2" x 4" supports, angled back and lag-screwed to the 4" x 4" uprights.
A large, low, work-and-display table built of redwood 2" x 12"'s surrounds the 4" x 4" vertical roof support in the middle of the house. This vertical also supports the overhead watering system.
The lone survivor of our original purchase. a Tillandsia bergeri, vegetated for a long time after it was tacked to a post outside and squirted occasionally with the hose. After it was mounted in the greenhouse, it began to thrive and finally rewarded us with its wonderful flowers. I want always to have at least one of these in this house.
A half dozen 3/4" iron pipes are mounted vertically to support those great pot supports I got from the people at Southern Exposure in Beaumont, Texas.
We have an automatic watering system. We had about three hundred species at the height of the collection, assuming of course, that they were correctly identified.
We lost a bunch during an extended cold snap at the same time that our water system failed. We have a more realistic attitude now. We collect the ones we like and have added some non-bromeliads such as Calibanus hookeri and a number of other odd caudiciform plants. Weird! But then, I suppose we are too.
One of the virtues of the height is the presence of a variety of microclimes. There is an area that is hot and sunny and infrequently watered. This is where we put the desert types. The cryptanthus are on the ground. If something isn't doing well in one place, we move it until we find a place where it does well. I had a Deuterocohnia lorentziana that wasn't doing too well. We moved it until we got it in a bright place with no direct sun and reasonable moisture and now it's doing well.
Perhaps I should mention that we don't mourn the loss of a plant. It is too bad, and we don't do it intentionally, but our plants have to learn to live with us, not us with them!
I have deliberately left off most measurements and fine details. A structure such as this should be a creation of the owner's imagination. I have simply provided a guide for one dream. There are others. I want to encourage those of you with a hammer to pound a few nails and make something for yourself. I mean to encourage, and instruct. Of course, should anyone want to write, I will write back and will try to help. But in the last analysis, it should represent you. My e-mail is cdills@charter.net.
It may not be Kew Gardens, but it is all ours.
P.S. I did make a few changes in the article and added some pictures and changed the others to color ones, recently taken!