Photos: Gorgeous Chrysanthemums At NY Botanical Garden

For three weeks, the New York Botanical Garden is showcasing the stunning displays of chrysanthemums in its new show, Kiku: The Art of the Japanese Garden.

Kiku is the Japanese word for chrysanthemum, and the flowers are "painstakingly trained" to grow in different shapes and styles. In fact, these plants have been 11 months in the making! The NYBG says, "Cultivated from tiny cuttings, the plants are pinched back, tied to frames, and carefully nurtured. Flower buds develop as the autumn nights grow longer, and in October the plants burst into bloom, a true celebration of the changing of the seasons."

There are both traditional and contemporary displays at the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory. The traditional arrangements include the "Ozukuri (Thousand Bloom)" technique, which involves a "a single stem...trained to produce hundreds of simultaneous blossoms in a massive, dome-shaped array" while there are also contemporary styles, like a bonsai-inspired tree.

Kiku opens tomorrow, October 5 and runs through October 27 at the New York Botanical Garden. There's also a poetry walk, taiko drumming on the weekends and, for this weekend's opening, programs on Japanese flowering arranging.