Boston Flora

Wednesday, March 30 – Saturday, April 2 – Olmsteds: Landscapes and Legacies

Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site, in partnership with the National Center for Preservation Technology and Training (NCPTT), will host a three-day symposium as part of Olmsted 200, the national bicentennial commemoration of the birth of Frederick Law Olmsted, social reformer and founder of American landscape architecture. The symposium will be held in Boston, home to the Emerald Necklace, Olmsted’s last great public project. Adjacent to Boston is Brookline where the Olmsted firm’s home and office resided through 1980. For Olmsted, “nothing else compares in importance to us with the Boston work…I would have you decline any business that would stand in the way of doing the Best for Boston all the time.”

Through events, education, and advocacy at the local and national levels, Olmsted 200 ensures that the legacies of the Olmsteds live on across the country by renewing public and policy commitments to the preservation and maintenance of our historic parks and places. Olmsted Now is the Greater Boston effort, an inclusive coalition that connects communities and organizations commemorating Greater Boston’s bicentennial of Brookline-based Olmsted with the “fierce urgency of now.”

Registration for Olmsteds: Landscapes and Legacies is live HERE. Learn more about the symposium at this link. $49 – $99.

Caring for Shrub Roses at the National Trust, Online

There is a new video from Britain’s National Trust on Caring for Shrub Roses. A couple of weeks ago, The Trust visited the sunken rose garden at Fenton House in Hampstead on a video tour to learn how their head gardener, Andrew Darragh cares for climbing roses. Now they are back with Andrew to learn how winter is the ideal time also for giving your shrub roses some care and attention. WATCH NOW Missed that other video? WATCH CARING FOR CLIMBING ROSES

Agassiz Rock Renamed The Monoliths

The Trustees of Reservations has renamed Agassiz Rock “The Monoliths” due to Louis Agassiz’s racist teachings being incompatible with The Trustees’ mission of inclusion.

The Trustees’ mission is to protect and share Massachusetts’ iconic places for the simple reason that nature and culture soothes the soul and improves the lives of everyone, not just some of us. While that mission never changes, The Trustees is always seeking to learn and grow to find new ways to live up to it.

It is with this commitment in mind that The Trustees announced its Agassiz Rock property in Manchester-by-the-Sea has been renamed “The Monoliths”—a nod to the site’s two massive, granite boulders. The change comes after more than a year of reflection and deliberation regarding the complex legacy of Louis Agassiz, the 19^th century biologist who published works that proposed that non-white human groups are inherently inferior.

After 65 years with the same name, people will want to know why The Trustees’ changed it now and what it hopes to accomplish.

There is no doubt that Agassiz’s theories about the rocks dotting New England’s landscape being shaped and deposited by glaciers and not the biblical flood that floated Noah’s Ark, as believed at the time, were groundbreaking. However, Agassiz also vehemently promoted the theory of polygenism—the view that humans of varying skin color are of different origins and non-white races are inherently inferior—to a degree that was considered extreme even for his time.

After receiving several letters from people in the community who questioned the appropriateness of honoring Agassiz despite his work that denied the humanity of African enslaved people, The Trustees embarked on a journey to research Agassiz the man and Agassiz the property, and to determine how tributes like this one align with its overall mission of inclusivity across its portfolio of 123 properties.

After creating an internal review process and speaking to internal and external stakeholders as well as staff and local historians, The Trustees decided to change the name—the first time that’s happened in its 130-year history. The name change is official on the website, trail maps, and the main sign on-site. In time, interpretive signage will be installed on the property that puts Agassiz’s scientific contributions in perspective while explaining why the name was ultimately changed. The goal is not an erasure of history; it’s a chronicling of change and taking an opportunity to learn and grow.

Save Crane Ledge Woods

For decades, a 24-acre forest, known locally as Crane Ledge Woods (CLW) and designated as an urban wild, has been inaccessible and mostly unknown to the surrounding neighborhoods of southwest Boston – Hyde Park, Roslindale and Mattapan. Now a multinational property company intends to construct 10 buildings containing 270 rental units, 415 parking spaces and several roads on this land. From a beautiful green space of crucial wildlife habitats – shady forest, flower-filled meadows, rocky alcoves and vernal pools – the proposed project would turn Crane Ledge Woods into an immense urban heat island of impervious asphalt and concrete. This ecological devastation would rob our local wildlife of their homes.

Crane Ledge Woods gets its name from Crane Ledge – a rock cliff offering a stunning view looking southwest across Hyde Park and the Stony Brook Valley far below. A forest of mature native trees and diverse plant life surround the towering granite cliff, preserving an inspiring sense of wilderness and keeping the area cool on hot days.

The view across the valley gives visitors a rare sense of Hyde Park as it existed more than a century ago, when Crane Ledge was a site for weekend picnics known as Pine Garden. BPDA has defined CLW as one of Boston’s “Urban Wilds & Natural Areas”. Although the property is not under the protection of Parks & Recreation Department, the city has identified this land as a key opportunity to make progress on its own climate resilience, environmental justice and open space equity goals. Crane Ledge Woods is more than half the size of Chinatown – one of Boston’s hottest neighborhoods in the summer due to tree loss and over-development. There is not enough plantable space in the entire neighborhood to replace the trees that would be lost due to the project proposed for Crane Ledge Woods, and none of those trees would reach maturity in most of our lifetimes.

For complete details of the proposed project, and information on The Crane Ledge Woods Coalition, visit https://www.savecraneledgewoods.org/

Thursday, March 31, 10:30 am – 11:30 am – James Burnett, Envisioning Landscapes, Making the Unseen Seen

OJB founding partner James Burnett shares the threads that run through the firm’s projects over the past 30 years. Noted for belief that landscape has the power to transform cities and strengthen communities, and commitment to addressing issues of access, equity, and health in their public spaces, OJB is the winner of the 2020 National Design Award for Landscape Architecture from the Cooper-Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. Notable projects include Klyde Warren Park in Dallas, one of the first highway capping deck parks; the community-centric Levy Park in Houston; and the Sunnylands Center and Gardens in Rancho Mirage, California, a desert botanical garden. He will share some of the unseen drivers that mark the work, including innovative sustainability features and green infrastructure solutions.

James Burnett, FASLA, has dedicated his career to revitalizing communities by creating meaningful spaces that challenge the conventional boundaries of landscape architecture. He is a distinguished Fellow of the ASLA and a 2016 recipient of the ASLA Design Medal. His new book, Envisioning Landscapes (Monacelli Press/Phaidon), explores the threads of ecology, site, and vision manifested in OJB’s garden and landscape work.

The New York Botanical Garden is sponsoring this March 31 lecture at the Ross Lecture Hall at the NYBG, 2900 Southern Boulevard in the Bronx. They are in the process of working on a hybrid, online option for their Winter Lecture Series, so if you are interested in hearing this talk, email adulted@nybg.org or call 718-817-8720. $32 for NYBG members, $35 for nonmembers.

Thursday, April 7, 2:00 pm – Beatrix Farrand, Garden Artist, Landscape Architect, Online

Beatrix Farrand, the only female founder of the American Society of Landscape Architects, is one of the most important landscape architects of the early twentieth century. Today, the scope of her work and her influence on the profession are widely acknowledged, and her gardens are being studied, restored, and opened to the public. A long-awaited updated edition of the 2009 definitive monograph, Beatrix Farrand: Garden Artist, Landscape Architect chronicles the life and work of one of the most important figures in American landscape architecture. In this Garden Conservancy webinar, Garden Club of the Back Bay member Judith Tankard will discuss the full breadth of the work of this iconic landscape architect. $5 for Garden Conservancy members, $15 general admission, with an option of $50 for webinar plus one copy of the book. Garden Conservancy educational programs are made possible in part by the Coleman and Susan Burke Distinguished Lecture Fund and the Lenhardt Education Fund, with additional support from Ritchie Battle, Camille Butrus, Courtnay and Terrence Daniels, Celia T. Hegyi, Rise S. Johnson, and Susan and William McKinley. Register HERE.

Judith B. Tankard is a landscape historian, preservation consultant, and the author or coauthor of ten books on historic gardens and garden designers, most recently Gardens of the Arts and Crafts Movement. Her other books include Ellen Shipman and the American Garden (winner of the J. B. Jackson Book Prize) and three works on Gertrude Jekyll. Tankard taught at the Landscape Institute of Harvard University for more than twenty years and served as a board member of the Beatrix Farrand Society. She’s a frequent lecturer on landscape history and a contributor to the British journal Hortus.

Monday, March 28, 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm – The Duc de Choiseul’s Chanteloup, Online

The late 1760s saw a number of French aristocrats remake their gardens ‘à la manière anglaise’, a naturalistic taste characterised by all the ‘bizarreness so dear to that nation’. The epidemic of Anglomanie that followed the Seven Years War produced some of the most extravagant landscapes of the age – meandering rivers, mysterious woods, rocky outcrops and cascades, false ruins, philosopher’s huts, all often confined within compact suburban sites. You may purchase a ticket for this March 28 Gardens Trust lecture, costing £5, by clicking HERE. Attendees will be sent a Zoom link 2 days prior, and a link to the recorded session will be sent shortly after the session and will be available for 1 week.

On Christmas Eve 1770 France’s political order was upended when Louis XV exiled his de facto chief minister Choiseul and his ruling clique. The urbane and wily statesman was sent from Versailles to distant Touraine and his country estate of Chanteloup. Forbidden from politics and intrigue, the duc reinvented himself as a gentleman farmer, much to the bemusement of his allies and enemies. Chanteloup boasted ‘marble’ stables, a model farm and crop yields that were celebrated in the opposition press. In 1773, he liquidated his collections and Paris properties to build a garden in the new Anglo-Chinese taste. At its heart was a towering Sino-Doric pagoda, loosely modeled on that of Kew. An improbable survivor, this costly monument to factionalism is the only trace of Chanteloup to survive. The extensive correspondence of his allies and reports in the newsletter press, however, offer remarkable insights into this opposition domain.

Image: © ATR Louis Nicolas Van Blarenburghe, the Pagoda of Chanteloup, Musée du Louvre

Monday, May 16 – Thursday, May 19 – 2022 National Garden Club Convention

The 2022 National Garden Club Convention returns live to the Rosen Plaza Hotel, 9700 International Drive in Orlando, Florida, on May 16 – 19. Registration deadline is April 25. All details may be found at https://gardenclub.org/2022-ngc-convention-details, including booking instructions with the hotel. Danielle Flood of ECHO and Gabrielle Burns of CORAHealth are featured luncheon speakers, the Wednesday dinner will spotlight Bruce Crawford of Willowwood Arboretum in New Jersey, and the Banquet on Thursday night will welcome guest designers Kebbie Hollingsworth and J. Ross Railey. Tours to NASA at Cape Canaveral, the Daytona Speedway, and two post-convention tours to the Winter Garden/Bloom & Grow Garden Society and Wekiva State Camp-Springs/Sandhill Habitat are also on offer.

Thursday, April 21 – Friends of the Public Garden Annual Meeting: Save the Date

Join The Friends of the Pubic Garden for its 52nd Annual Meeting at the Omni Parker House Hotel on Thursday, April 21. The featured speaker will be Senator-Elect Lydia Edwards. All signs point to an in-person meeting; watch for details at http://friendsofthepublicgarden.org

Wednesday, April 6, 6:45 pm – 8:15 pm – Wild Wings: Fascinating Pollinators and Their Stories, Online

What do an annoying house fly, the nearly endangered Mexican long-tongued bat, and a poop-eating butterfly have in common? Each creature, respectively, is the reason we are able to enjoy a bite of chocolate, a nip of tequila, or the calming scent of lavender.

Liana Vitali, a naturalist and educator at Jug Bay Wetlands Sanctuary in Maryland, tells fascinating stories about pollinators around the world during an immersive audio-visual survey. From bees to bats and everything in between, Vitali’s vignettes offer an entertaining, informative glimpse into the lives of these pollinating winged marvels—and how our lives depend to a great extent on their unique and wild ways.

This Smithsonian Associates online talk will take place April 6 beginning at 6:45 pm, and is $20 for Smithsonian members, $25 for nonmembers. Register at www.smithsonianassociates.org.

If you register multiple individuals, you will be asked to supply individual names and email addresses so they can receive a Zoom link email. Please note that if there is a change in program schedule or a cancellation, we will notify you via email, and it will be your responsibility to notify other registrants in your group. Unless otherwise noted, registration for streaming programs typically closes two hours prior to the start time on the date of the program. Once registered, patrons should receive an automatic email confirmation from CustomerService@SmithsonianAssociates.org. Separate Zoom link information will be emailed closer to the date of the program. If you do not receive your Zoom link information 24 hours prior to the start of the program, please email Customer Service for assistance.