The Nantucket Garden Festival is a celebration of the island’s natural beauty, featuring inspiring garden tours, engaging lectures, and vibrant floral demonstrations. Your sponsorship provides essential support for this beloved event and organization. Don’t miss this opportunity to join us in cultivating beauty and sustainability on Nantucket. Events include a Van Garden Tour with Greyson Keller, a Floral Design Workshop with Kelsey Day, an evening gathering with Todd Forrest, a Children’s Fairy Garden Workshop, ‘Sconset Walking Tour, and a Keynote Lecture and Luncheon with celebrity gardener Wambui Ippolito. For tickets and complete information visit https://www.ackgardenfestival.org/event-schedule
Join Archaeologist Dan Zoto on July 13 for a guided walk of Wing Island, the location of the Wing Island Archaeology Project. Learn about the archaeology of the island and its diverse history that includes Native Americans, Brewster’s first colonists, 19th century salt works, and other topics. This Cape Cod Museum of Natural History program is $15, rain or shine, with limited space and required registration at https://ccmnh.org/events/walk-with-our-archaeologist-36484 The walk is approximately 1.3 miles over somewhat challenging terrain.
You’re invited to hear from Gilbert Newton, Cape Cod author and science educator. This July 10 event is being co-sponsored by the Barnstable Land Trust. The Barnstable Land Trust is a community-supported nonprofit whose mission is to preserve the natural resources and special places in the Town of Barnstable and nearby areas. The talk will be held at the Sandwich Public Library, 142 Main Street in Sandwich beginning at 6:30 pm. Free admission, but tickets are suggested at https://thorntonburgess.org/events/thornton-w-burgess-nature-lecture-series-seashore-by-gil-newton-31637
The Nantucket Garden Club will host a GCA Flower Show July 16 and 17 at the Siasconset Casino, 10 New Street in Siasconset, Nantucket. Arrangement classes include A Whale of a Tail, On the Horizon, The Captain’s Table, Shipwreck, and Nantucket Red, along with Photography and Horticulture Divisions. A pdf of the guidelines may be accessed HERE.
The Garden Club Federation of Massachusetts Southeastern District Standard Flower Show is at Heritage Museums and Gardens July 17 – 19. The theme is Game On! To obtain a copy of the schedule and enter your design, contact Christine Decas at christinedecas@comcast.net or Dolores Ahern at doloresma67@gmail.com This major New England flower show is presented at Heritage by the Garden Club Federation of Massachusetts Southeastern District’s garden clubs and its award-winning Design Study Group. View beautiful, creative floral and botanical arts designs and educational exhibits related to this year’s theme – Game On! Entrance to the flower show is free with admission or membership. No advance registration required for visitors. Hours are 1:00 pm – 5:00 pm on Wednesday, 10 – 5 on Thursday, and 10 – 7:30 on Friday.
On June 20, the Martha’s Vineyard Garden Club, in collaboration with Polly Hill Arboretum, will be sponsoring a lecture by Adam Wheeler, Production and Horticulture Manager at Broken Arrow Nursery in Hamden, CT. Adam will speak on “Native Plants with a Twist: Unexpected Excitement from our Native Flora.” Adam stresses that native plants don’t have to be boring! In this informative and educational lecture, he will explore the unique and exceptional slide of our native flora and present his current favorite native trees and shrubs for general garden use. This includes design considerations, cultural requirements, and other critical details. A special emphasis will be given toward unusual variation and unexpected use. Both novice and experts alike will find value in the details provided. This lecture will be held in the Far Barn at Polly Hill Arboretum beginning at 5:00 p.m. Registration is required. The cost is $5.00 for MVGC and PHAmembers and $10.00 for non-members, payable upon registration. Here is the link for registration: https://form.jotform.com/240526018970152
2024 is an especially special year for the Martha’s Vineyard Garden Club. It is celebrating the Club’s Centennial and hopes you will join the members at one of its upcoming events! “We have both historic and celebratory happenings coming up, with several nods to recounting the Club’s stunning history. Several fundraisers and some members-only events will be sprinkled in, and it all promises to be a lovely tribute to all the founding members and Garden Club members who followed have contributed to the Island over the past 100 years. The Club’s perennial fundraiser, Blooming Art. is slated for June 14, 15 and 16, so we hope you will join us to celebrate the diverse art of Island artists and the talent of its Garden Club members with this annual art and floral event. This year the work of over 35 Vineyard artists will be exhibited with all art available for purchase. The art sold at Blooming Art will benefit the Club. A portion of the proceeds is donated by the artist to the Martha’s Vineyard Garden Club’s charitable projects.”
Blooming Art Event will be open to the public on Friday, June 14 and Saturday, June 15 from 10:00 am until 5:00 pm and on Sunday, June 16 from 10:00 am until 3:00 pm. No pre-registration is necessary, an admission fee of $15.00, will be taken at the door and all art will be available for purchase. For more information and a list of participating artists, visit https://www.marthasvineyardgardenclub.org/blooming-art—preview-2024.html
What is it about ‘New England’—as both a setting and a subject—that has captured Impressionist painters’ attention for over a century? Artist colonies popped up in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Connecticut in the late 19th century, attracting some of America’s best-known painters. Gloucester, Provincetown, Old Lyme, Ogunquit, and others continue to have thriving local art communities today. On display at Heritage Museums & Gardens in Sandwich now through October 20 in the Special Exhibitions Gallery, this exhibition celebrates New England–its natural beauty through the seasons, its people, its small towns, and its glorious light–as seen through the eyes of local painters and poets.
Included artists: Sam Barber, Gerrit Beneker, Sheila Benzer, Matilda Browne, William Chadwick, Oliver Chaffee, Anne Ramsdell Congdon, Joseph DeCamp, Frank Vincent DuMond, Harold Dunbar, Charles Ebert, Joseph Eliot Enneking, Loretta Feeney, Gertrude Fiske, Lillian Hale, Childe Hassam, Charles Webster Hawthorne, Henry Hensche, Aldro T. Hibbard, Felicie Waldo Howell, Wilson Henry Irvine, Louise Kamp, Nellie Augusta Knopf, Susan Ricker Knox, Harriet Lumis, Dodge MacKnight, Elmer MacRae, Willard Metcalf, George L. Noyes, Hillary Osborn, Pauline Palmer, Marguerite Pearson, Jane Peterson, Doug Rugh, Frank Vining Smith, Mary Bradish Titcomb, John Twachtman, Edward Charles Volkert, Carol Whorf Westcott, John Whorf, Mabel May Woodward, New England-based poets Amanda Davis, Lauren Wolk, and Rich Holschuh were invited to create or share works inspired by Fall, Summer, and Winter, respectively. Also included is a Spring-themed poem by Provincetown poet Mary Oliver. For hours and information visit www.heritagemuseumsandgardens.org
Join Larry Millman, author-ethnographer-mycologist, for an informative, entertaining and engaging Fungi Foray in Beebe Woods. The Highfield Hall and Gardens program takes place May 29 from 4 – 6 at 56 Highfield Drive in Falmouth. Larry has studied fungi all over the world– especially in his own backyard of New England. As you wander through the woods on this mushroom walk, Larry will focus on fungal ecology rather than edibility. You’ll learn what fungi are doing in their respective habitats as well as their common names. Bring a hand lens or magnifier if you have one (some of the species will be very small) and a sense of curiosity. Larry has written 16 books including Fungipedia: A -Z. $10 for Highfield Hall members, $15 for nonmembers. Register at www.highfieldhallandgardens.org
The Aptucxet Garden Club of Bourne presents Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, a National Garden Club Small-Standard flowr show, on Thursday through Saturday, May 30 – June 1, from 1 – 4 at the Briggs-McDermott House, 22 Sandwich Road in Bourne. Free admission.
