Gardens and natural places as refuge

I took part in a webinar today hosted by the Garden Conservancy.  The topic was gardens as refuge, which seemed interesting. 

I joined the Garden Conservancy so it would be "free" -- thinking that was a good thing, regardless.

Julie Moir Messervy was one of the panelists, along with the director of Longwood Gardens.

Her thoughts were remarkable, of course, as she's been thinking deeply for a long time about how our gardens and landscapes ground us, both our personal gardens and in public places.

My two visits to the Toronto Music Garden, listening to the audio guide, count among my most remarkable garden memories.  She spoke today about "garden collections" -- gardens that we remember, but may never visit again.  Telling.

This was my last post about it, in 2015, on Natural Gardening.

I'm quite sure I've made a comment on FB about it since -- it's such an amazing place.

The director of Longwood Gardens spoke about how, after 3 months closed, their members flooded back for frequent visits.  I feel like that with the North Carolina Arboretum and Biltmore Estate.

He said that his (and many of the returning visitors) favorite places were Longwood's 100-acre recreated meadow and Pierre's Woods (at the heart of the old estate).

I'm not surprised.  I was SO glad to walk along Bent Creek when the NC Arboretum opened up again, and I was grateful for the ability to cycle along Biltmore's trail along the French Broad River, too, yesterday morning, even as I dodged moms and kids (lots of them) on small bicycles.

A Blue Ridge mountain view



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