Covington’s Nursery & Landscape colorful potting bar allows customers to pot up their purchases — or ask for help — on-site.

November/December 2024
From the Road: Dallas’ diverse garden retailers By Teresa McPherson

The Garden Center Group Fall Event took place Sept. 23-26 in Dallas, with a full-day tour that stopped at six unique garden centers.

Jacksons Home & Garden

Walking into Jacksons Home & Garden feels like entering a high-end department store — and it should, considering general manager Randi Schwartz’s background working for Neiman Marcus. The lifestyle store, founded by Bob Jackson over 40 years ago, began as a pottery store and has since bloomed into a destination for pottery, plants and designer brands for both indoor and outdoor living.

Designs on the stairs promise it’s “worth the walk” upstairs, where more outdoor living merchandise abounds.

The retail showroom’s tabletop department includes designer merchandise and a gift registry.

Jacksons reportedly has the largest outdoor pottery collection in the Southwest.

Nicholson-Hardie

Nicholson-Hardie began as a simple seed store in 1899 and now has two locations just five blocks apart in Dallas’ high-end shopping district, Lovers Lane’s Miracle Mile. Nicholson-Hardie Home and Garden is the indoor store, with houseplants, accents and gifts, home décor, and gardening tools.

The outdoor store — Nicholson-Hardie Nursery — opened in 1984 and offers perennials, shrubs and topiaries, as well as statuary and containers. Wandering the green goods feels more like a walk in the park than a walk in a garden retail store.

Nicholson-Hardie Home and Garden uses a card catalog to display gardening books.

A lighted display case keeps houseplants happy — and catches the eye.

Nicholson-Hardie Home and Garden’s home décor items and houseplants mingle in this display.

The resident cat leads the way to the garden shop at Nicholson-Hardie Nursery.

Lush green goods and a street lamp create a park-like atmosphere at Nicholson-Hardie Nursery.

Calloway’s Nursery

Calloway’s Nursery was founded in 1986 by local nursery professionals to provide not only the highest-quality plants, but also unique offerings not previously offered in the area. This location, the newest Calloway’s Nursery, features plants, pottery, fountains, outdoor living, and accent and décor items.

Color-coded signs provide basic plant details, with separate QR codes linking to plant-growing information and a staff-written blog post related to the plant.

Garden art pops out of the plant material displayed at Calloway’s.

Calloway’s makes use of a long cash wrap counter to display holiday and impulse items.

Covington’s Nursery & Landscape

High school sweethearts Joe and Gayle Covington opened Covington’s Nursery & Landscape more than 50 years ago. Today, it’s one of the largest retail and wholesale nurseries in Texas, with 18 acres of trees and premium plant material, as well as garden accessories and outdoor living merchandise.

A colorful potting bar allows customers to pot up their purchases — or ask for help — on-site.

Covington’s set up a hay maze for customers inside one of its greenhouses.

Branded pots at Covington’s reinforce the retailer’s green and yellow identity.

Greenhouses are clearly marked for customers to easily find what they are looking for.

Ruibal’s Plants of Texas

In 1984, Michael Ruibal began selling bedding plants in a 10-by-20-foot stall at the Dallas Farmers Market. Now, he and sons Mark and Matt operate on nearly two city blocks downtown, including interior gardens located in the historic Harland building. Ruibal’s stocks bedding plants, perennials, shrubs, trees and tropicals, as well as pottery and gift items.