Gardeners and landscapers will gather at the Memorial Art Gallery, 500 University Avenue in Rochester, Saturday, March 1, to gather information, advice and inspiration for creating inviting landscapes during the 23rd annual Spring Garden Symposium.
The event is presented by the Rochester Civic Garden Center and St. John’s Living.
This year’s featured speakers are acclaimed landscape designer, author and lecturer Julie Moir Messervy and Jean Westcott, owner of the Artful Gardener on Mt. Hope Ave. in Rochester.
“We are thrilled to bring award winning author and landscape designer Julie Moir Messervy to town,” says Christine Froehlich, executive director of the RCGC.
Messervy, whose best known work is the three-acre Toronto Music Garden designed in collaboration with cellist Yo-Yo Ma, will present, “Landscaping Ideas that Work,” during her morning lecture. The talk will be based on her newly published book of the same name and will include a multitude of ideas and images of landscapes which will draw you and your family outside. Messervy will discuss how to create outdoor living spaces that work with your home and yard as well as your way of life.
Her afternoon lecture entitled, “Home Outside – Creating the Landscape You Love,” is based on another of her books. In this talk, Messervy will help gardeners understand the principles of landscape design, allowing them to turn their own yards into the “home outside” of which they have dreamed. Images and diagrams will be used and Messervy will help participants identify their own personal styles as well as address landscaping and gardening challenges in a step-by-step way.
Local garden designer Jean Westcott specializes in restoring older landscapes and designs architecturally appropriate gardens for her clients. She will present a slide lecture inspired by her own interest in garden history and which will challenge participants to see the garden in a new way. During “Ornament in the Garden – A Designer’s Perspective,” Westcott will discuss how garden ornaments have been used in the landscape and how to incorporate that experience into your own garden.
The 2014 Spring Garden Symposium opens at 8:15 a.m. on March 1. The event includes a lunch break, book sales and signing and the Gardeners’ Marketplace with garden goods, books, plants, seeds, gifts and more.
Tickets are $48 for RCGC members; $58 for non-members, and are available by calling 585-473-5130 or online at www.rcgc.org. The Symposium ticket allows all-day access to the Memorial Art Gallery’s collections, organizers say.
