What determines your purchase?

[Connie Star]

Like others have said, great thread!
I've been growing orchids for a little over a year and a half. I started with what the beginner book from "Dummies" recommended, a phal. Not knowing what I was doing, I inadvertently bought a Phal type dendrobium, which just won me my first blue ribbon at the Mass Orchid Society show.
I have most of my orchids in the living room, so I look for plants that look good when they are NOT in bloom. To me the phals, most dens, masdies paphs and phrags are graceful looking out of bloom, but the catts and oncidium types do not look so good except when in bloom. I'm trying to limit the number of genera I grow, so far without much success.
In all honesty it is still the "wow" factor that hooks me and reels me in.