WITHERING HEIGHTS

THE ORCHID REEF Longstanding shop Foliage Garden overflows with tropical trees and orchids.

The Flower District—which threatens to be phased out—is the Holy Grail of plant bargains. Get 'em while you can.

By Amy Chozick
Photographs by Astrid Stawiarz

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Ched Markovic picks his way through a jungle of leafy green corn plants, ficus trees and hanging ivy to reach a cash register buried under empty terra-cotta pots and bags of soil. He notices a brown leaf and momentarily abandons the transaction to gently clip the dead weight from an otherwise healthy stem of Lucky bamboo.

"A lot of the uptown retailers think selling plants is just a business. They don't really care about the plants themselves," Markovic, the owner of Noble Planta, says. His charming disheveled forest of a store (106-A W 28th St; 212-206-1164) is one of a handful of shops in the Flower District, the endangered stretch of plant and flower wholesalers dotting 28th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues. These verdant oases sell an immense variety of houseplants and small trees—from the pedestrian to the exotic—at prices far below those at the city's tonier boutique florists. Markovic, a Yugoslav immigrant, opened shop in 1978, during the Flower District's heyday. Back then, the area was practically a midtown nature preserve, with sidewalks overflowing with fresh, lush foliage. In the early '90s, when the enclave became trendy, developers bought out many of the family-run stores to build condos and office spaces. Today, prospects do not look bright for the neighborhood's plant peddlers.

"We all know it's just a matter of time before we get kicked out," says Richard Walker, co-owner of Foliage Garden (120 W 28th St; 212-989-3089), a gold mine of orchids and tropical trees. It's no hyperbole to say that the deals at Foliage Garden and its sibling 28th Street vendors won't last long. Despite the formation of a Flower Market Association to fight developers and pleas to the mayor and to State Senator Thomas K. Duane, most of the horticulture-loving folks in the Flower District believe their days are numbered. "These stores serve a unique function, and we'd like to keep them where they are," says Senator Duane, who is known for fighting overdevelopment in his Manhattan district. "But market forces are impacting them."

In an effort to stem the tide of high-rise, residential condos and retail businesses flooding the neighborhood, Walker has even proposed that the city close the district to traffic, pave the streets with cobblestone and install gaslights to make it a historical site. "No mayor has gone for it," he says, adding, "We just don't produce enough revenue for the city to care about us." But nature-deprived, shop-savvy New Yorkers should care deeply about the Flower District's diminishing presence, because without it, bargains on stylish succulents, rare bromeliads, stately topiaries, dwarf citrus trees and more will also disappear.

"Some of the more expensive retailers can afford to double the price of a plant—but not us," Markovic says, holding up a Golden Pothos, a common hanging houseplant with green- and yellow-tinted tendrils of heart-shaped leaves. "If this plant dies, I'll need to sell five to make up for it." He explains that haughty retailers with big budgets for advertising and store decor can charge twice the price for a plant and still afford to lose a few to disease or neglect. Since Flower District vendors deal largely in wholesale and don't have the pedigree or the budget of the chic sellers, they can't get away with scoring a hefty profit off one sale. Instead, they keep overhead at a minimum and plants hearty so they won't have to raise costs. This allows the 28th Street shops to sell large quantities of flora with long life spans at wholesale prices. To illustrate the kinds of steals that could soon die out, we've identified some Flower District bargains and compared them with the steep prices on the same greens at highbrow purveyors around the island.

Among Noble Planta's extensive selection of low-maintenance, toxin-absorbing succulents is the pink, stemless desert flower echevaria. Planted in an 8" terra-cotta pot with chalky, weathered stones at its base, this stark specimen costs $20, and just $15 if you buy two. At florist Jane Packer's hip locale in the Terence Conran Shop, a smaller echevaria in a 6" glass cube will set you back $35; if you want it in a silver tray, be prepared to cough up $55.

C&M Farms (105 W 28th St; 212-244-0081), a long, narrow store with a topiary monkey swinging from the ceiling, flaunts large flats of wheat grass, otherwise known as a detoxifying power drink when juiced. C&M Farms sells a patch of wheat grass in a 13" x 51Ž2" wooden box for $13.50. You get less for more at eye-catching West Village floral shop Spruce, where a 6 "x 4" wooden box of the same grass is $15.

The main attraction at neighboring shops Holiday Foliage (116-118 W 28th St; 212-675-4300) and Foliage Paradise (112 W 28th St; 212-675-9696) is the constantly changing crop of $15 rare leafy bromeliads. Distinguished by bold rosette foliage, spiky centers and plastic-like blooms, these tropical perennials fetch $24 at the Chelsea Wholesale Flower Market. For an extra $15 and $13, respectively, Holiday Foliage and Foliage Paradise will pot, wrap and deliver the exotic long-bloomers. The Chelsea Wholesale Flower Market has a $50 minimum on deliveries, with a $12 surcharge.

Fischer & Page (134 W 28th St; 212-645-4106) has an impressive cut-flower business that makes it a Flower District favorite. The attached, less-frequented plant shop has a quaint, familial setting and offers a fresh, if slightly limited, stash of houseplants, notably a first-class selection of stately English topiaries. These include a ring of kitchen-ready fragrant rosemary ($35), a ball of bushy myrtle ($40), and a ring- or ball-shaped evergreen ivy with fleshy oval leaves ($20). Similarly sculpted plants, sold in moss-covered terra-cotta pots, earn a prominent spot in Takashimaya's romantic floral boutique, where they start at an exorbitant $85 for a single ball of ivy or myrtle. Plaza Flowers, the in-house flower shop at Barneys, sells a grand 5' ivy topiary for $500.

Topiary is for pure decoration, but aloe, the ubiquitous warm-weather succulent, pays for itself by providing a summer's supply of cool sunburn relief. The Plant House (127 W 28th St; 212-244-1333), manned by Flower District vet Milan Zijic, whose black Harley sits in front of his snug but orderly shop, sells the healer in 6" clay pots for $10. Smith & Hawken, the national chain and catalog business, sells the same aloe for $20, plus $18 if you want it in a copper pot—minus the motorcycle and mom-and-pop atmosphere.

Across the street from Zijic's store, large citrus trees, twisted shrublike Spiral juniper and several types of palms form a living wall in front of Foliage Garden. Jonathan Finegan and his wife, Mary Ann, opened the store in 1981 (Walker came aboard in '96) and in 1994, bought a greenhouse on Long Island to grow orchids, amaryllis and other specimens for the shop. The store sells 5' Kentia palms, a multistemmed standing houseplant with thin, airy leaves, for $125. The same tree goes for around $200 at the Chelsea Garden Center.

So stock up on stems while they're cheap. And take care to keep your plants watered and healthy, because if your green thumb turns black and your beloved plants die, without the Flower District's deals, even the shabbiest replacements might break the bank.