We made a trip to Washington D.C. yesterday with the kids on Spring Break. We stopped by the large IKEA store right off I-95 just south of D.C. to look around. The store is huge and full of their cool furnishings.

They have a sizeable "Green Room" where they sell pots, potting benches, and all kinds of gardening accessories. They had a very large section of plants for sale, most of which were orchids in bloom or bud!

They had tons of very nice compact epidendrums and paphiopedilums!!! All were named hybrids. Many were vinis and various Maudiaes but surprisingly there were dozens of primary hybrids and species!!! I saw roth x chamberlianianum, esquirollii (sp?) x several other species, exul, insigne x something among others. The plants were all in nice shape! I bought a nice green striped Maudiae to give as a gift!

So if you are lucky (or unlucky enough) to live or drive by a large city where IKEA has their large showrooms and warehouses it may be worth stopping by to take a look at the plant section! I've seen only one other Ikea showroom and that was in LA.

Oh yeah! I forgot to mention that all the plants were $22!!!

All of their locations are listed on their website. Here is their link: http://www.ikea.com/ms/en_US/

Thanks for the hot tip! I am not too far from a couple of big Ikeas and will have a look.

I have been watching for years wondering where, if anywhere, large supplies of Parvi and multi-floral Paphs might turn up that were bloomed out and not selected for breeding or show.

For all the people out there growing greenhouses full of these things to select the top few plants, I am surprised there has not already been widespread sale of whatever does not "make the cut" so to speak.

Or maybe there has been and just not around here.

Certainly not around here either. Our TJ's only *just* started selling those 2 common maudiaes, though I have heard of other areas in the states getting more interesting selections.

I've seen orchids at Costco and Sam's Club, but they are not usually in great shape and I've never seen a paph.

Someone on ebay is liquidating. If anyone is interested, I figured I'd better post...

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=42218&item=4369607182&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW

Happy shopping!

I went to IKEA today & they have been pretty picked over-still some nice blooming ones, but many knocked out of their pots, laying on top. I asked the salesperson if they'd be marked down, since some of them looked dire-she said unfortunately, they're just thrown out instead of marked down (which may or may not be true, I purchased 3 'as-is' paphs 2 weeks ago).

I got a Paph 'Pinocchio' x paph. esquirolei, blooming, with another bud, however, the stem which I thought was bent, was nearly severed, so I snipped it-I'll try to figure out how to post a picture. The plant was so large & healthy, w/at least 4 fans (are these called 'growths' or 'divisions' or something else entirely?), that I couldn't let it meet a horrible end...