Daily Archives: August 6, 2022

Garden Time is the Inaugural Recipient of the Page Dickey Grant for American Gardens

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The Garden Conservancy is pleased to award this endowed $10,000 grant, the Page Dickey Grant for American Gardens,  to Garden Time in Providence, RI. Garden Time provides prison-based garden education programs and prepares incarcerated individuals for the workforce by supporting successful transitions to reentry and long-term employment.

In 2011, Garden Time’s Co-Founders worked with inmates at the men’s maximum security facility at the Rhode Island Adult Correctional Institutions to build a garden in the empty section of the prison yard. Since then, they have added two more gardens at other facilities within the complex and trained 300 incarcerated men and women to become skilled gardeners. While producing thousands of pounds of produce for the prison kitchen, participants have also gained a positive outlook and a new connection to nature. In 2017, Garden Time expanded their work to include a pre-employment program at the men’s medium-security facility offering important life skills and job training for the green industry with reentry planning and support.

 In 2020, Garden Time partnered with OpenDoors, a Providence-based nonprofit that supports formerly incarcerated individuals reenter society, to build a Reentry Community Garden, benefiting Garden Time graduates as well as OpenDoors clients and residents. The community garden at OpenDoors offers a space to perform reentry planning, job coaching, and continuing plant-based education. To further extend opportunities for released students, Garden Time piloted a tree care and environmental justice training program in 2021 allowing formerly incarcerated Rhode Islanders to learn technical skills related to tree care and other green industries through classroom and hands-on instruction. 

The Page Dickey Grant for American Gardens honors our dear friend and longtime board member Page Dickey’s lasting contributions to the Garden Conservancy and to garden enthusiasts nationwide. As part of the Garden Conservancy Grant Program, this grant will be awarded each year, in perpetuity, to a distinguished small public garden making a significant impact in its community through garden-based programming.

Learn more about the Page Dickey Grant for American Gardens here.

Saturday, August 20, 10:30 am – 12:30 pm – Therapeutic Horticulture: Fragrant & Culinary Herbs

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Take deep breaths, slow down and leave your “to do” list behind. Experience the therapeutic benefits of horticulture while enjoying and creating delicious and fragrant items with amazing herbs. In this New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill class on August 20, you will make different culinary and fragrant items with fresh and dried herbs, while learning basic techniques. Information will be shared on herb plants you can easily grow. All of these provide rich input for our senses which positively affects our health and wellness. Feel calm and refreshed with positive energy by focusing on being in the moment and engaging each of your five senses – sight, touch, sound, smell and taste – while interacting with sensory rich plant materials.

Our class will include an overview of the therapeutic benefits and power of horticulture to understand why and how it can be used personally, and for people of all ages and abilities. We will discuss the difference between therapeutic horticulture and horticultural therapy. You will learn about benefits including increased relaxation, decreased anxiety, stress relief, sensory stimulation, hope, improved cognitive abilities, engagement in life, “connectedness,” and physical exercise. It will be clear how plants and the natural world give you support when life gets overwhelmingly busy or stressful. We will spend approximately 40 minutes delving into this.

You will spend approximately 80 minutes exploring herbs in the gardens, harvesting a variety of herb plants and learning how to dry a variety of herbs so they last. We will use the herbs, including mint, chamomile, and rosemary to make culinary items, including teabags and herbal mixes for cooking. We will also use fragrant herbs, including lavender, to make sachets and potpourri. Adding herbs to your life can bring beauty to your home, taste to your food, health and can also make lovely gifts. Join Deborah Krause, Horticultural Therapist, in these relaxing sessions where you may leave with a smile, feeling of calm and peace, and pride in your creations.

Deborah Krause is a Registered Horticultural Therapist. She is passionate about wellness and the therapeutic benefits of horticulture for people of all ages and abilities. She has served in various capacities in the American Horticultural Therapy Association (AHTA) and the Northeast Horticultural Therapy Network (NEHTN), which she co-founded, and currently is on the Board of Directors. Deborah developed the horticultural therapy program at Perkins School for the Blind and was the horticultural therapist and coordinator of the horticulture center there for 40 years. She is currently a Program Coordinator at The Nature Connection whose mission is to improve the well being of individuals and communities through the therapeutic use of nature. Deborah is the horticulture educator at the Memorial Spaulding School Garden where students renovated a garden and grow produce to donate to food pantries. She presents webinars for AARP on adaptive gardening as we age. Deborah consults with non-profit organizations and programs to design and facilitate therapeutic and educational horticulture and nature programs. Deborah’s popular classes for adults creating sensory rich seasonal flower and plant arrangements have focused on relaxation, stress reduction and positive thinking and she is honored and happy to continue to bring this to New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill.

$50 NEBG members, $65 nonmembers. Register HERE.