You’re invited to a gardening talk by Coleson Bruce
December 13, 2023 Central Texas gardeners, join me on Thursday, January 18th, for a Garden Spark talk by Coleson Bruce, an Austin gardener extraordinaire! Tickets are on sale now. This is an in-person event, and seating is limited, so grab your spot today. And hey, a gardening talk makes a great holiday ...
Come learn how to boost wildlife habitat with a hedge
November 14, 2023 Photo: Cambria Harkey Central Texas gardeners, join me on Thursday, December 7, for a Garden Spark talk by Austin landscape architect Shaney Clemmons, principal and founder of Shademaker Studio. She’ll tell us why biodiverse hedges are a greener choice than fences — in every sense — including ...
John Hart Asher kicks off Garden Spark’s Season 7 with prairie garden presentation
August 27, 2023 Prairie and native-plant advocate John Hart Asher, principal of Blackland Collaborative and host of the PBS show Central Texas Gardener, spoke at Garden Spark last Thursday. His engaging and informative presentation provided an excellent Season 7 kickoff for the speaker series about garden design and ecology that ...
Come hear a talk about making a pocket prairie
July 17, 2023 Central Texas gardeners, let’s gather together for a new season of Garden Spark talks starting on August 24th! It’ll give you something to look forward to in the midst of this heat wave to end all heat waves, and you’ll learn from experts in the Austin gardening ...
Garden Spark kicks off Season 7 next month
July 05, 2023 Garden Spark returns for its 7th season on August 24th, kicking off a series of in-person talks by three of Austin’s best garden thinkers. If you love gardens, design, and learning, these talks are for you! This season we’ll learn how to “become the bison” and create ...
Teri Speight shares Black Flora stories at Garden Spark
October 22, 2022 Author Teri Speight came to Austin this week to share inspiring stories from her new book, Black Flora, at my Garden Spark speaker series. An enthusiastic audience came out to hear Teri’s talk under the big live oak at beautiful Barton Springs Nursery. Here are a few ...
Black Flora talk brings flower power this Thursday – join us!
October 16, 2022 Flyer by Barton Springs Nursery Garden Spark brings Black Flora author Teresa Speight to Austin this Thursday for a presentation sure to be filled with beautiful florals and inspiring stories about the Black florists, flower farmers, and other floral creatives who make them. Tickets are on sale ...
Great turnout for Kinlers’ Garden Spark talk; next talk on sale now
September 26, 2022 Lorie and Michael Kinler of Kinler Landscape Architecture in Fort Worth brought their ideas for reimagining what a front yard can be to Austin for my Garden Spark series last Thursday, kicking off Season 6. They shared a number of design tips that I’ll be keeping in mind for ...
Garden Spark kicks off 6th season with exciting new speakers
August 10, 2022 Garden Spark returns for its 6th season on September 22, kicking off a new series of entertaining speakers — garden designers, authors, landscape architects — who’ll be sharing their expertise and ideas at in-person events here in Austin. This season we’ll be inspired to reclaim our front ...
At the Wildflower Center with Jennifer Jewell
June 04, 2022 When Jennifer Jewell of Cultivating Place came to Austin a month ago, we visited the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center together. I enjoy showing visitors around our state botanical garden, planted exclusively with native Texas plants. In early May, the late-spring wildflowers were in party mode. Wildflowers ...
Come hear Garden Spark talk by Jennifer Jewell
April 21, 2022 Austin-area readers, you’re invited to my next Garden Spark talk on Thursday, May 5th! Jennifer Jewell of the award-winning podcast Cultivating Place will present “Cultivating Place: How a Place-Based Garden Culture of Care Strengthens Places and Their People.” Jennifer is also author of two excellent books, The ...
Wisteria-scented Garden Spark at Barton Springs Nursery
April 16, 2022 Last week I hosted one of my Garden Spark talks at Barton Springs Nursery, and their beautiful outdoor classroom was made even more beautiful by a wisteria in full bloom. If you know anything about Chinese wisteria, you know it’s a monster of a vine. But its ...
Blue trees in Austin’s Pease Park spotlight tree loss around the world
April 11, 2022 If you’ve visited Kingsbury Commons at Austin’s Pease Park lately, you may have encountered a startling and surprisingly beautiful sight: clusters of trees with Majorelle blue trunks and limbs. The Blue Trees is a temporary environmental art installation by New Zealand artist Konstantin Dimopoulos. It brings our ...
Come hear a talk about using art to enhance a garden, plus all about Garden Spark
March 23, 2022 Five years ago I started a speaker series about garden design, asking designers and landscape architects I admired, garden authors I found interesting, and other design thinkers to come share their ideas. I called it Garden Spark, with the tagline “garden design talks for thinking gardeners.” It ...
Garden Spark talk held under the stars at Barton Springs Nursery
September 26, 2021 Photo: Barton Springs Nursery After a hiatus of a year and a half, my Garden Spark speaker series returned last Thursday with a presentation by always-inspiring landscape architect Tait Moring, in a beautiful new outdoor classroom at Barton Springs Nursery. I’ve been trying to get Tait for ...
Garden Spark returns for 5th season at new location
August 11, 2021 A few months ago I was finalizing an exciting lineup of speakers for the 2021-22 Garden Spark season, as optimism was high for getting back to normal after a year of social distancing and deferred plans. Today the mood is more somber. The pandemic is clearly not ...
