Boston Flora

Month: February 2015

  • Friday, April 24 – Monday, April 27 – Bubbles and Blossoms, and Art in Bloom

    For the 39th year, garden clubs and professional designers from across New England will create artistic floral arrangements at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), for Art in Bloom.

    Arrangements will be inspired by artwork found throughout the Museum, including the re-imagined Greek galleries and newly installed Arts of the Pacific Gallery, as well as the new Hokusai exhibition.

    Special events include an illustrated lecture and Japanese Ikebana floral demonstrations, as well as flower arranging master classes presented by Christian Tortu, France’s most renowned floral designer.

    For a preview of the arrangements, a Bubbles and Blossoms event on Friday, April 24 (6 pm-9:30 pm, $30 members, $50 non-members), celebrates spring with a festive evening of bubbly and light bites.

    Sunday, April 25, is Family Day, offering a variety of family-friendly events, including live entertainment and various art-making activities.

    Daily tours, elegant tea and flower-designing demonstrations will be held throughout the weekend.

    Tickets for all Art in Bloom events go on sale February 26 at 10 am on mfa.org. Follow the MFA on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest for news and updates about Art in Bloom.

  • Wednesday, March 4, 7:00 pm – 8:15 pm – Natural Vegetable Gardening from the Ground Up

    Natural Vegetable Gardening from the Ground Up with Paul Split, writer, teacher, gourmet cook and nationally recognized horticultural consultant, will be sponsored by The Evening Garden Club of West Roxbury on Wednesday, March 4 from 7 – 8:15 at the Elks Lodge, 1 Morrell Street in West Roxbury. Learn about soil profiles, growing mediums, composting, fertilization/watering, raised beds and plant selection, including how to inter-plant vegetables, herbs and flowers to maximize plant health, productivity and beauty. There will be a demonstration of how to start seeds using a domed propagation chamber, which will be raffled. Propagation kits will be available for purchase. Paul always draws a crowd – don’t miss this event. $10 payable at the door – no reservations needed. The Elks Lodge is opposite the West Roxbury Veteran’s Hospital.  Image from www.organic.lovetoknow.com.

  • Wednesday, March 4, 7:00 pm – Unnatural Selection

    Join author Emily Monosson at Porter Square Books, 25 White Street (Porter Square Shopping Center in Cambridge) on Wednesday, March 4 at 7 pm for a discussion on her latest book Unnatural Selection: How We are Changing Life, Gene by Gene.

    Gonorrhea. Bed bugs. Weeds. Salamanders. People. All are evolving, some surprisingly rapidly, in response to our chemical age. In Unnatural Selection, Emily Monosson shows how our drugs, pesticides, and pollution are exerting intense selection pressure on all manner of species. And we humans might not like the result.  Monosson reveals that the very code of life is more fluid than once imagined. When our powerful chemicals put the pressure on to evolve or die, beneficial traits can sweep rapidly through a population. Species with explosive population growth — the bugs, bacteria, and weeds — tend to thrive, while bigger, slower-to-reproduce creatures, like ourselves, are more likely to succumb.

    Monosson explores contemporary evolution in all its guises. She examines the species that we are actively trying to beat back, from agricultural pests to life-threatening bacteria, and those that are collateral damage — creatures struggling to adapt to a polluted world. Monosson also presents cutting-edge science on gene expression, showing how environmental stressors are leaving their mark on plants, animals, and possibly humans for generations to come.

    Unnatural Selection is eye-opening and more than a little disquieting. But it also suggests how we might lessen our impact: manage pests without creating super bugs; protect individuals from disease without inviting epidemics; and benefit from technology without threatening the health of our children.

    Emily Monosson is an environmental toxicologist, writer, and consultant. She is an adjunct professor at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, author of Evolution in a Toxic World: How Life Responds to Chemical Threats, and editor of Motherhood: The Elephant in the Laboratory.

    For more information visit www.portersquarebooks.com.

  • Monday, March 9, 5:30 pm – 6:30 pm – Water Conservation: Landscape Design Strategies

    Each year millions are spent on designing, building, and maintaining landscapes that use too many unsustainable resources and rely on unsustainable practices. There is little thought given to water conservation in traditional landscape design and the result is a continuing depletion of our water resources. Gary Krause is committed to landscapes designed with water conservation in mind. As drought conditions become the norm in many parts of the country, the need for water-conscious landscape design becomes more critical. This Ecological Landscaping Alliance webinar presentation on Monday, March 9 from 5:30 – 6:30 will address many water conservation techniques including plant choices, material selection, and irrigation options. With careful planning, landscape designs can provide alternatives to our clients and create sustainable landscapes that are both beautiful and water-conscious.

    Gary Krause holds a degree in design and maintains a wide range of certifications including permeable pavers, drainage systems, rainwater harvesting, and is a Certified Sustainable Landscaper. Gary has over 30 years’ experience in gardening, landscape design, construction, and maintenance. Gary believes that the future for sustainable landscapes is very promising thanks to all of the new technology in plant genetics, ‘Smart Water’ irrigation products, and other water-conserving innovations.
    – See more at: http://www.ecolandscaping.org/event/webinar-water-conservation-landscape-design-strategies/#sthash.lCiWYbzT.dpuf

  • Wednesday, March 4, 7:00 pm – 8:30 pm – Wild Orchids of New England

    On Wednesday, March 4, from 7 – 8:30, Grow Native Massachusetts will sponsor a free talk by Bill Brumback, Director of Conservation, New England Wild Flower Society, to be held at the Cambridge Public Library, 449 Broadway in Cambridge.

    Did you know that New England is home to more than 50 species of native terrestrial orchids? Although not so showy as the tropical orchids of the florist trade, our hardy species have fascinated botanists for centuries.

    Adapted to specific habitats from Maine’s northern woodlands to the sands of Nantucket, these orchids are fascinating in their diversity and their adaptations. Discover more about our New England orchids, their haunts, their peculiar lifestyles, their rarity, and their pollination systems. Learn which ones are cultivated in the nursery trade and adapted to gardens, and how we can conserve all of these species.

    Bill Brumback has worked for the New England Wild Flower Society for several decades. His contributions to the conservation of our region’s flora are extensive, and his work to propagate and protect Robbin’s cinquefoil in New Hampshire’s White Mountains led to its recovery and subsequent removal from the U.S. Endangered Species list. He has been studying the rare native orchid, small whorled pogonia (Isotria medeoloides), for thirty years and claims that he still doesn’t understand it.

  • Friday, February 27 – Sunday, March 1 – Canton Garden Club Artist in Bloom 2015 – POSTPONED UNTIL APRIL

    POSTPONED: The Canton Garden Club and the Canton Public Schools present Artists in Bloom 2015.  This exhibition combines the talents of Canton students with creative floral arrangements of Canton Garden Club members.  The exhibit was to have taken place at Pequitside Farm, 79 Pleasant Street in Canton, on Friday, February 27 (5:00 pm opening), Saturday February 28 and Sunday, March 1 (noon – 4).  Now, due to our unprecedented snows, the event will be held in April.  Visit the website for more information.

  • Wednesday, March 4, 5:30 pm – 7:00 pm – Charles Eliot and the Modernization of Boston’s Landscape

    Charles Eliot was the son of Harvard President Charles William Eliot, a visionary landscape architect, and protégé of Frederick Law Olmsted. He inspired the 1891 Trustees of Public Reservations — what is now the oldest regional land trust in the world — and had a central role in shaping the Boston Metropolitan Park System. He was the guiding vision behind the transformation of the banks of Charles River in Cambridge and, although he did not live to see his plans reach fruition, his work accelerated the rescue of the Charles from a virtual sewer to one of the most picturesque features of region’s landscape. On Wednesday, March 4, from 5:30 – 7 pm, at the Massachusetts Historical Society offices at 1154 Boylston Street in Boston, Professor Anita Berizbeitia will talk about Eliot’s work and his legacy in landscape design.

    Anita Berrizbeitia is Professor of Landscape Architecture and Director of the Master in Landscape Architecture Degree Programs at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Her research focuses on design theories of modern and contemporary landscape architecture, the productive aspects of landscapes, and Latin American cities and landscapes. Berrizbeitia has taught design theory and studio, most recently at the University of Pennsylvania School of Design, where she was Associate Chair of the Department of Landscape Architecture. Her studios investigate innovative approaches to the conceptualization of public space, especially on sites where urbanism, globalization, and local cultural conditions intersect. From 1987 to 1993, she practiced with Child Associates, Inc., in Boston, where she collaborated on many award-winning projects. She was awarded the 2005/2006 Prince Charitable Trusts Rome Prize Fellowship in Landscape Architecture. A native of Caracas, Venezuela, she studied architecture at the Universidad Simon Bolivar before receiving a BA from Wellesley College and an MLA from the GSD.

    The Landscape Architects series of the Massachusetts Historical Society has been made possible by the generous underwriting of Stephen Stimson Associates Landscape Architects and is cosponsored by the Mount Auburn Cemetery and the Nichols House Museum. $10 fee (no charge for Fellows and Members of MHS, Mount Auburn Cemetery, and the Nichols House Museum.) Register online at https://dnbweb1.blackbaud.com/OPXREPHIL/EventDetail.asp?cguid=76FBBAD5-59FC-442D-8347-A5AE40DBF561&eid=50858&sid=30B92800-1EE0-40A8-94EC-6D7F80E0E8E9

  • Friday, March 6, 6:45 pm – Case Studies in Domestication and Biological Invasions in Genera Cichorium and Centaurea (Asteraceae)

    The 1,100th Meeting (yes, you read that correctly) of The New England Botanical Club will take place Friday, March 6, beginning at 6:45 in the Haller Lecture Hall, Room 102, Geological Museum, 24 Oxford Street in Cambridge, celebrating students.  The speaker will be Tomas Zaveda of UMass Boston, delivering a paper on Case Studies in Domestication and Biological Invasions in Genera Cichorium and Centaurea (Asteraceae.)  Free and open to the public.  For more information visit www.rhodora.org.

  • Mondays, March 9 – April 13, 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm – Botanical Illustration with Graphite

    Botanical illustration has been a practiced art for hundreds of years. This Boston Center for Adult Education course will give you a brief overview of the history of this art form and will show you the basics of how to draw flowers and plants with shading, perspective and form in graphite. We will begin with basic graphite techniques and move on to simple flower and plant structure. Students will learn about composition, light and methods to make your artwork “alive.” Each week will focus on a different flower provided by the instructor. Medium used will be graphite pencils.

    Materials List:
    11×14 pad Strathmore drawing paper – 400 series (brown or green cover; NOT yellow 300 series)
    11×14 pad tracing paper (Canson preferred)
    Set of graphite pencils (at least 2B, HB and 2H; you do not need more than that) – Faber- Castill or Prismacolor best brands
    Kneaded grey erasers (2)
    Battery operated pencil sharpener (Panasonic KP-4A is BEST; available online but lesser models should be okay)

    The instructor is Nancy Bentivegna. Nancy Bentivegna was born and raised in Ithaca, NY. Art was always her favorite subject in school and she pursued this passion in the art program at Penn State University where she earned her B.A. After college, she worked in marketing and advertising with several large firms in New York. In 1999, she started her own design firm, Kester House, and began creating custom home décor for clients throughout the New York metropolitan area. Her works include furniture, murals, decorative accent pieces and soft goods (pillows, linens, etc.). In 2008 she began the Botanical Art and Illustration Program at the New York Botanical Garden. Ms. Bentivegna completed all course work in June 2011 and then relocated to Boston. She primarily works in watercolor combined with colored pencil for depth and detail. Her works have been displayed in specialty shops in Connecticut and her original botanical artwork is part of private collections from New York to Florida.

    Classes will meet Mondays, March 9 – April 13, from 7:30 – 9:30 at the BCAE, 122 Arlington Street in Boston. The fee is $204 ($173 for BCAE members) with a materials cost of $15. Register online at http://www.bcae.org/index.cfm?method=ClassInfo.ClassInformation&int_class_id=12403&int_category_id=1&int_sub_category_id=1&int_catalog_id=0, or call 617-267-4430.

  • Tuesday, March 3, 6:30 pm – Emerald Necklace Night at Symphony

    Please join The Emerald Necklace Conservancy on Tuesday, March 3 at Symphony Hall in Boston for a special event to benefit the Justine Mee Liff Fund for the Emerald Necklace. Generously hosted by the BSO, the evening will feature a pre-concert dinner reception and raffle followed by a performance of Stravinsky, Debussy and Brahms. Dessert reception at intermission. Tickets are $150 and $250 (preferred seating) available online at https://25749.thankyou4caring.org/party-in-the-park/night-at-symphony?erid=526776&trid=1f1d5801-d8e9-44bb-bee6-b82e767de6f9 or by contacting Emma Rose Kiefer at 617 522 2700.