The National Chrysanthemum Society has signed a contract with the Crowne Plaza Hotel – Commerce/Pasadena for the upcoming national convention. The show will be held at The Huntington Gardens in Pasadena. The dates are November 7 – 10, 2019. Last year’s convention showcased 198 exhibits by 24 exhibitors from eight states – the 2019 Convention promises to be even bigger and better. Visit www.mums.org for all the latest information, registration details, and discount hotel bookings.
Summer is the high season for pestos, the time to gather savory fresh greens and turn them into flavorful sauces for winter enjoyment. A dish of fragrant, pesto-slathered pasta really warms up an icy winter day but, as a sauce, pesto has many other uses in the kitchen.
Pesto alla Genovese, the classic sauce of Genoa, and pistou, the traditional herb sauce of Provence, are made with basil. However basil is only one of many flavorful greens that can become the heart of a rich, flavorful pesto or sauce.
A wide variety of flavorful leafy greens—mints, kale, garlic mustard, parsley, spinach, sage, dandelion greens, cilantro, arugula—can be used to make pesto and savory herb sauces and pastes. Pesto and sauces can be with or without cheese, nuts and garlic. Pesto and herbal sauces freeze well and can be used all winter long to add delicious herbal flavor to soups, spreads, meats, salads and vegetables, as well as traditional pasta meals.
Class members will taste a wide variety of pestos and herbal sauces and discuss the ingredients used. After demonstrating how to make pesto and herb paste, each person will make a pesto or herb paste to take home. Recipe sheets and all supplies are included. This class will take place at Tower Hill Botanic Garden in Boylston on August 18 from 1 – 3:30, and is $65 for THBG members, $79 for nonmembers. Register at www.towerhillbg.org.
Betsy Williams teaches, lectures and writes about living with herbs and flowers. A gardener and herb grower since 1972, Betsy trained as a florist in Boston and England. She combines her floral and gardening skills with an extensive knowledge of history, plant lore and seasonal celebrations. Betsy is the author of several books on the uses and stories of herbs and flowers. She has appeared on the Discovery Channel and greater Boston cable stations as well as local and national radio talk shows. Betsy lectures and teaches locally and nationally.
Join Polly Hill Arboretum Grounds Manager/Arborist Ian Jochems on August 21 for an informative and fun evening walking tour of the many glorious mature trees of Edgartown. Among the hydrangeas and picket fences, many unique and fine specimen trees await discovery. As one past participant noted, “I will forever after see the town’s trees with new eyes and greater appreciation.” Sponsored by Donaroma’s Nursery and Landscape Services. $20 ($15 for PHA members). Pre-register by calling 508-693-9426.
Join local wildlife biologists Liz Olson and Luanne Johnson from BiodiversityWorks on Tuesday, August 20 at 5:30 pm at the Polly Hill Arboretum in West Tisbury for a journey into the lives of Island black racers. Since 2016, BiodiversityWorks has been tracking black racer movements and habitat use from the Katama plains to Squibnocket ridge. Learn about the biology and behavior of our largest snake species as well as how to identify the other resident snakes. While they can’t bring a black racer to the talk, Liz and Luanne will do their best to bring one or two other sssspecial guests. Photo courtesy of Martha’s Vineyard Times.
$10 / $5 for PHA members.
Enjoy a walk through the Heritage Museums and Gardens on August 15 from 10:30 – noon as Horticulturist Laura Swain and Curator of Hydrangeas Mal Condon simplify the process of selecting plants to complement and highlight hydrangeas throughout the season. For the novice or expert gardener, this workshop will encourage creative experimentation and provide information needed to start designing your own space. While Mal covers the major hydrangea species and their preferred growing conditions, Laura will delve into design, sharing tips and techniques for site analysis, planting layers, and considering structure, texture, and color.
$17 for Heritage members, $27 for nonmembers. Register at www.heritagemuseumsandgardens.org
Big Plans examines the role of visual images in support of progressive social reform in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum exhibition features large-format urban plan drawings and small-format documentary street photographs. Big Plans considers the urban planning proposals developed in the service of social reform by Frederick Law Olmsted and Charles Eliot in relation to the political picture-making of Lewis Hine, and the cultural place-making of Isabella Stewart Gardner. The exhibition presents the invention of landscape architecture as a progressive response to the social and environmental conditions for working-class immigrants in the industrial metropolis and raises contemporary questions as to who advocates for the social, cultural, and environmental health of the city today.
Join us at the Museum on September 12 at 7 pm for a discussion of urban plans as cultural works and the role of cultural imaginaries in progressive urban reform, featuring presentations by and conversations with:
Anita Berrizbeitia, Harvard University
Toni Griffin, The Just City Lab
Nikil Saval, Reclaim Philadelphia
Sara Zewde, Dumbarton Oaks
Introduced and moderated by Charles Waldheim, Ruettgers Curator of Landscape. Tickets are required and include Museum admission. $15 adults, seniors $12, students $10, free for members. Register buy calling box office at 617-278-5156, or online at https://www.gardnermuseum.org/calendar/event/lecture-big-plans-20190912
Please join the Boston Planning & Development Agency (BPDA) on August 14 at 6 pm to kick off the design process for a new Greenway Park at Parcel 2. The BPDA has partnered with the Massachusetts Department of Transportation and the Rose Kennedy Greenway Conservancy to design a park on the vacant site located between North Washington Street, Anthony “Rip” Valenti Way, and Beverly Street. Join us in the Hanover Room at the Courtyard by Marriott Boston Downtown/North Station, 107 Beverly Street, Floor 4, to learn more about the design process, share your ideas, and discover how you can participate in shaping the park design. You may also tweet your ideas to the BPDA (@bostonplans) using the hashtag #GreenwayP2. For more information contact Kennan Rhyne at kennan.rhyne@boston.gov.
The Cultural Landscape Foundation is pleased to announce that What’s Out There Weekend San Francisco Bay Area will take place on September 14 and 15, 2019. Drawing on the Bay Area’s rich cultural landscape legacy, this weekend of free, expert-led tours will feature dozens of sites, including gardens, campuses, plazas, public parks, and cultural institutions. An online city guide and printed guidebook will be produced in tandem with the Weekend. For a complete itinerary and registration information visit https://tclf.org/whats-out-there-weekend-san-francisco-0
Seed saving brings tremendous benefits to the willing gardener. Learn from Kate Stafford how seeds develop, stay dormant, and germinate. This hands-on workshop covers harvesting, cleaning, and storing a wide spectrum of native seeds. Spend time in the field observing and collecting seeds, then practice cleaning. Take your seeds home at the end of class. Bring a lunch and dress appropriately for the field.
Co-sponsored by Native Plant Trust, the class will take place at Nasami Farm on August 18 from 10 – 3, and is $66 for sponsor members, $80 for nonmembers. Register at www.ecolandscaping.org
Charbrook Farm is the modern homestead of Lauren and Stephen Stimson and their family at 71 Gates Road in Princeton, Massachusetts. Located down the road from the historic Stimson Farm and Charbrook Nursery, this working farm has become a field station for the STIMSON landscape architecture practice. A Master Plan for Charbrook Farm has been in process since 2008. Seasonal events, lambing, plant walks, nursery digs and studio retreats are all integrated into the culture and life of STIMSON. Long-term goals for the property include an agricultural arboretum, demonstration perennials and working gardens for a future design studio. A guided tour by Lauren and Stephen on August 16 from 3 – 5, sponsored by the Ecological Landscape Alliance, will discuss the concept of integrating ecology, agriculture and landscape architecture. $23 for ELA members, $33 for nonmembers. Register at www.ecolandscaping.org
Lauren Stimson, ASLA, holds a Master of Landscape Architecture and a Master of Regional Planning from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She received her B.A. from Bates College in Maine where she studied Theater and Geology. She is a licensed Landscape Architect in the state of Maine. Lauren has a deep love for New England, where she was raised, and an interest in the overlap between the built environment and the rural landscape, especially as it relates to historic villages and farms. She is an avid oil painter and uses the medium to document the familiar character of regional landscapes and agrarian patterns. Painting helps inform her design thinking as a landscape architect and conceptual approach to graphic representation. She learns a great deal about plants from her garden and is passionate about food and cooking. Lauren has been a studio instructor at the University of Massachusetts, and has given talks and lectures at the International Symposium of Landscape Ecology, the Ecological Alliance, the ABX Symposium, Smith College and the Boston Society of Landscape Architects. She currently serves on the Stewardship Council for the Cultural Landscape Foundation.
Stephen Stimson, FASLA, is Principal and Owner of STIMSON. Born and raised on a dairy farm, Stephen’s agrarian heritage has inspired and shaped the landscapes he has created across New England and the country. He received his education from the University of Massachusetts and the Harvard Graduate School of Design and has been practicing landscape architecture for over thirty years. He founded the firm in 1992 and is licensed in thirteen states.
Stephen’s work has been widely recognized with numerous awards from the Boston Society of Landscape Architects and the American Society of Landscape Architects. He has taught at Harvard Graduate School of Design and the University of Massachusett, and has lectured and served on award and design juries throughout the country. Stephen was elected as a Fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects in 2004 for his outstanding achievements in the field of landscape architecture. For over a decade now, he has been cultivating Charbrook Nursery on his family’s historic dairy farm, for project use and field research related to native plant propagation, collected species, planted form and soil specifications. He remains passionately involved in design and projects at all levels throughout the studio and loves to draw by hand. When he is not in the studio or at a site visit, he can usually be found on a tractor somewhere on the farm, with his daughter and son on his lap.
