Whether it’s recent or longstanding, personal or cultural, history will certainly be on everyone’s minds at the 2026 PHS Philadelphia Flower Show when it opens at the end of February. This year’s theme, fitting for the United States semiquincentennial, is “Rooted: Origins of America.”

This year not only marks the 250th birthday of the U.S., but also the 199th anniversary of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society (PHS) and the 197th anniversary of the Philadelphia Flower Show. Local landscapers, florists, designers, and schools are gearing up to participate in this year’s show and represent Northwest Philadelphia.

Apiary Studio, a relatively new Germantown-based landscape architecture firm that launched in 2015, is bringing an ancient twist with a theme based on the Latin term “Hortus conclusus,” a medieval enclosed garden.

“When you think of an American garden, you think of a suburban landscape with a backyard and a picket fence … and that is usually an exclusionary device,” said Hans Hesselein, principal of Apiary Studio. “But we’re playing with that idea and creating a boundary around our garden that is meant to be inclusive and to foster dialogue and interaction between people.”

This will be Apiary Studio’s fifth year participating in the Flower Show. Hesselein and Martha Keen, Apiary’s horticulture manager, expressed excitement about continuing to showcase their designs at an event where Apiary has won awards including the Governor’s Trophy for innovative design and a gold medal for landscape design.

“We’re starting to get some decent familiarity with how the Flower Show works. We try to do things differently, challenge convention, and come up with novel concepts,” Hesselein said.

In contrast, another popular local flower shop is grounding its display in decades of local history. Robertson’s Flowers & Events is an enduring part of Chestnut Hill’s community.

“We’re coming up on our 100-year anniversary next year, which is kind of exciting,” said Taylor Ferry, co-owner of Robertson’s. Robertson’s creative team suggested centering their 2026 Flower Show exhibit on their own history, which “felt like a natural way … to celebrate this occasion for our company. Over the years, Robertson’s has won numerous Flower Show awards including best in show honors.

Ferry and his cousin, co-owner Sarah Thom, are fifth-generation Robertsons. Ferry described how the Flower Show had evolved from “true, green-thumb gardening” over 100 years ago, when his great-great-grandfather participated, to the artistic displays of today.

“This year in particular, we’re replicating our storefront from the corner” of Germantown and Highland avenues, Ferry said. Each window in the display will represent a 20-year period throughout Robertson’s history. He added that the historical angle is especially engaging for designers, who can use props and art pieces relevant to each time period.

Although more contemporary, Apiary Studio’s designers will also emphasize creativity. “We’ll make weird art pieces, we’ll use crazy lighting or sculpture,” Keen said. “It adds a little bit of magic and makes us stand out.”

Students at the Lankenau Environmental Science Magnet High School in Upper Roxborough are also bringing an artistic approach to the Flower Show.

“We’re all artistic people; we like being creative and using our imaginations to create things,” said Tamia Brown, one of four student leaders working on the school’s exhibit. “So with the Flower Show, we get to do that and bring our ideas to life, and think that’s really fun.” This will be Lankenau’s second year in the show.

The students are taking inspiration from Truelove Seeds, a nearby farm that allows “people from all different cultures to grow their [own] cultures’ herbs and plants,” Brown said.

As a result, the students’ exhibit will have a cultural focus.

“Tamia and I are both Jamaican,” said Amelia Pennycooke, another Lankenau student leader. “For the exhibit, we’re growing plants like Jamaican pumpkin, sorrel, and wintermelon. That is very connected with [our theme], culture, because it connects to our own personal backgrounds.”

Last year, Lankenau won a PHS Bronze Medal for Education.

This year’s show is sure to offer an added dose of excitement in the wake of the nation’s 250th birthday. It’s also a fundraiser for the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, whose mission is to advance the health and well-being of the greater Philadelphia region through horticulture. Going to the show is “a really tangible way of ensuring that PHS’s mission is successful,” Keen said. And, she added, “it’s really, really fun.”

The Philadelphia Flower Show at the Philadelphia Convention Center, 1101 Arch St., is open to the public Saturday, Feb. 28, through Sunday, March 8. For more information, visit phsonline.org/the-flower-show.