Florist Torsten Ulbrich’s Enchanting Garden

The love for decoration runs in the blood of the owner of this German garden – vases of all shapes and sizes are scattered here and there, various supports for climbing plants, sculptures made of terracotta, wood, rusty metal, and even glass. It resembles a garden-museum, but it’s actually a garden-exhibition: many of these decorations are available for purchase.

Ulbrich Garden (Garten Ulbrich) is located in the city of Solingen, between Cologne and Düsseldorf, in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The owner of the garden, Torsten Ulbrich, is a florist by profession.

From generation to generation, the family has been involved in the cultivation and sale of plants, and Torsten inherited the territory of a former nursery: 80 acres of land, enormous firs and pines providing shade, and old greenhouses. One of the greenhouses was successfully restored (floral arrangements are displayed inside), while only the foundation remains of the others. The territory was developed step by step. The first thing they did was beautify the foundation of the old greenhouse and create a regular garden within its boundaries with boxwood borders and flower beds.

At present, visitors to the garden can stroll through a dozen different “garden rooms.”

The rooms are separated by walls, arches, or flower beds.

At the entrance, there is a boxwood garden with free-standing trimmed figures.

Further along the path, passing by the house and the exhibition area, you reach the greenhouses. To say that they are richly decorated would be an understatement.

The main theme of the garden near the house is terracotta.

I was particularly impressed by this flower bed with Pinball Wizard lilies.

On the other side of the lilies, red glass balls glisten.

The boxwood theme continues in the baroque garden with flower beds “embedded” in boxwood borders.

The baroque garden borders a large pond with a waterfall. Its landscaping was completed in 2012.

All the earthworks were carried out with an excavator. After excavating the bed, a layer of sand was added and a butyl rubber membrane was laid.

The maximum depth of the pond is 1.2 meters, which is sufficient for water lilies. Along the banks, large-leaved perennials were planted: rodgersias, hostas, darmeras…