Camellia Love exhibition announced to take place in South Carolina

On February 21, the Mid-Carolina Camellia Society (MCCS) and Historic Columbia will co-host Camellia Love, a camellia exhibition and sale. The exhibition honors and remembers Doris Kahn, longtime member of MCCS and officer of the Garden Club Council of Greater Columbia. MCCS is a club with a mission to inspire, promote and develop an interest in camellias. The free February event will be held at the Boyd Foundation Horticultural Center on the grounds of the Hampton-Preston Mansion from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The exhibition will feature a large display of club members’ late blooming camellias grouped on tables by flower form: single, semi-double, anemone, peony, rose form double, and formal double.

According to Betsy Kaemmerlen, president of MCCS and mother to 85 camellia varieties in her Columbia garden, the exhibition will focus on camellia knowledge and the sheer enjoyment of their beauty. Club members will have stations set up on the grounds to help visitors identify their camellia varieties, answer questions about camellia cultivation and care, and to demonstrate one camellia propagation technique, air layering. A popular camellia floral design booth will showcase the ‘winter rose’ in a variety of arrangements for weddings, centerpieces, and for bringing the outdoors inside during winter.

Rebecca Townsend, horticulturist at Historic Columbia will provide guided tours of camellia varieties in the Hampton-Preston Mansion gardens. Townsend said there are over 95 Camellia japonicas growing across four Historic Columbia gardens.