
If you’re trying to get in the mood for spring, the best way to do so is to check out the Boston Flower Show, coming to the Seaport World Trade Center in Boston, March 16 – 20. Wellesley’s own Mass Horticultural Society, with the help of hundreds of volunteers, is heavily involved in the show, managing all the amateur competitions. This includes floral design, amateur horticulture competitions including plant rooms, bay windows, individual house plants/horticulture exhibits, and junior horticulture, Ikebana display, miniature gardens, and photography. Mass Hort will also have a garden exhibit on the main floor, as will Rutland Nurseries, which has an office in town.
After that, you’ll want to get the Museum of Fine Art’s yearly Art in Bloom exhibit on your calendar, April 30 – May 2. Over 50 New England garden clubs and professional designers will create floral arrangements that artistically interpret works of art in the museum.
Several Wellesley groups have ties to the show, including the Wellesley Gardeners’ Guild, which took me on as a member ages ago. This year, in a moment of weakness, I agreed to serve as my club’s Head Arranger for the prestigious show. It must have been the word prestigious that got me into this predicament. Such pridefulness has left me in the position of having to apply the elements and principle of design to a floral arrangement that will be compatible with, yet not overshadow, the object to which my able assistant and myself have been assigned. That object? Three early-American silver bowls. Pray for us.
Here are a couple pics of MFA associate Carolyn Ellis showing the Wellesley Gardeners’ Guild how it’s done. She had my total attention.


More to come on this. Because I will not be able to shut up about it until it’s all said and done.
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