The King’s Garden at Fort Ticonderoga presents the Fourth Annual Garden & Landscape Symposium on Saturday, April 18. This day-long symposium, geared for both beginning and experienced gardeners, provides helpful insights from garden experts who live and garden in upstate New York and northern New England. This springtime event takes place in the Deborah Clarke Mars Education Center and is open by pre-registration only.
This one-day program focuses on practical, easy-to-implement strategies for expanding and improving your garden or landscape. The programs are offered in an informal setting that encourages interaction between presenters and attendees. Speakers and sessions include:
- “The Healing Garden: Traditional Medicinals for Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow” by Nancy Scarzello
- “Save the Monarchs! Native Plants for Native Pollinators” by Emily DeBolt
- “A Favorite Place of Resort for Strangers: The King’s Garden at Fort Ticonderoga” by Lucinda Brockway
- “Getting Control of Your Perennial Garden” by Amy Ivy
- Panel Discussion with all the speakers facilitated by Master Gardener Diane O’Connor
Registration for the Garden & Landscape Symposium is limited, so register early. The cost, including the day-long symposium and a lunch prepared by Libby’s Bakery Café, is $75 ($65 for members of Fort Ticonderoga). A brochure with the complete schedule and registration form is available on Fort Ticonderoga’s website at www.fortticonderoga.org by selecting “Explore & Learn” and then “Life Long Learning” on the drop-down menu. A printed copy is also available upon request by calling 518-585-2821.
The Garden & Landscape Symposium is one of numerous opportunities for continuing education for the public at Fort Ticonderoga in 2015. You can learn more about these programs, including the annual War College of the Seven Years’ War and the Seminar on the American Revolution, by visiting the Fort’s website at www.fortticonderoga.org and selecting “Explore & Learn.”
About Fort Ticonderoga’s “King’s Garden”
Fort Ticonderoga has a long and layered horticulture history. The center of Fort Ticonderoga’s horticulture program today is the walled Colonial Revival King’s Garden which was designed in 1921 by leading landscape architect Marian Coffin. The formal elements – a reflecting pool, manicured lawn and hedges, and brick walls and walkways – are softened by a profusion of annuals and perennials, carefully arranged by color and form. Heirloom flowers and modern cultivars are used to recreate the historic planting scheme. Visitor favorites include the lavender border, towering hollyhocks, bearded irises, dinner plate dahlias and many types of phlox.
Outside of the nine-foot brick walls of the colonial revival King’s Garden, the Discovery Gardens include a children’s garden, military vegetable garden, native garden, cut flower garden, and early 20th century tenant farmer garden. The restored Lord and Burnham greenhouse, charming gazebo, sweeping lawns and shady picnic spots invite visitors to explore the landscape at one of America’s oldest gardens dating to the French occupation of the fort in the mid-18th century.
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