Westport Garden Club Celebrates 100 Years Of The Beauty Of Flowers
Westport Garden Club's Show on Saturday, "Westport's Town Treasure" was certainly just exactly that. A TREASURE!
Photos By J.C. Martin For WestportLocalPress.com Click on an image to enlarge and open gallery.
The Westport Garden Club’s 100th Anniversary Flower Show: “Westport’s Town Treasures” filled Hoskins Hall at Saugatuck Congregational Church with color on Saturday. Close to 300 visitors reveled in the beauty that filled the hall during the day. The show was the club’s first official NGC (National Garden Clubs) sanctioned show in nineteen years. Members attended the NGC Flower Show School for two years to prepare for Chairing the show, featuring exhibits in horticulture, floral design, photography and education. The Club had traditionally held a flower show every two years and had long hoped to revive the program.
Photos above, clockwise from top left: Some of the beautiful Dahlias on the main table greet visitors. Top Right photo: (L. to R.) Westport Garden Club members Nathalie Fonteyne, Joanne Heller, Kelle Ruden and President Megan Lott with the original artwork designed for the show’s program by Westporter Kerstin Rao. Bottom left: Jane Howard of Fairfield with her prize winning Giant Dahlia. Bottom right, an arrangement alongside two of the books published on Westport including one by the New Yorker.
Photos By J.C. Martin For WestportLocalPress.com Click on an image to enlarge and open gallery.
A special award, created by the Westport Garden Club as a “People’s Choice Award,” was determined by attendee ballot at the show and went to Peggy Townsend of the Garden Club of Newtown for her design incorporating a vegetable.
Above photo: (L. to R.) Westport Garden Club President Megan Lott, WGC People’s Choice Award winner Peggy Townsend, Kara McKenna Wong and Kelle Ruden, Show co-chairs.
Photos By J.C. Martin For WestportLocalPress.com Click on an image to enlarge and open gallery.
The Club chose the show’s theme “Westport Town Treasures” to celebrate and honor the community. Four of Westport’s notable environmental groups provided the educational exhibits, highlighting how each has enhanced Westport’s Pollinator Pathway, established in April 2019: Aspetuck Land Trust, Earthplace, Friends of Sherwood Island and the Town of Westport Conservation Department.
Photos By J.C. Martin For WestportLocalPress.com Click on an image to enlarge and open gallery.
In the photography exhibits, provided by amateur photographers from around the state, each class honored a treasured local resource in its title and highlighted gardens, nature settings and pollinators. The show’s Botanical Arts Photography Award went to Kelle Ruden of the Westport Garden Club for her photograph of a monarch on milkweed at Sherwood Island State Park. This section was judged by Westport professional photographers Stacy Bass and John Videler along with Master Flower Show Judge Mary Ann Tyma.
The show’s program cover was designed to commemorate the event and honor the club’s history by former Westport Public School teacher and artist Kerstin Rao, (above, 4th photo from left) who offered limited edition tea towels and notecards at the show, with a portion of the proceeds benefiting the garden club. The design features a garden at Compo Beach that the club has maintained since 2007.
Photos By J.C. Martin For WestportLocalPress.com Click on an image to enlarge and open gallery.
More about the Westport Garden Club-
The club is among the nation’s oldest, and its founding member roster includes many names familiar to Westporters: Wakeman, Coley, Bradley, and Staples. Sara Crawford, Connecticut’s first female Secretary of State was an early member as was noted garden writer Helen Van Pelt Wilson. The club’s first project was the installation of a memory garden at Christ & Holy Trinity Church. In subsequent years, the club developed Grace K. Salmon Park, which had once been a dump site and organized residents to save Cockenoe Island from becoming a nuclear powerplant.
Further afield, the club supported the establishment of the Connecticut College Arboretum, the founding of the Connecticut State Federation of Garden Clubs (which now includes 113 clubs and over 6,000 members), the development of tree and shrub plantings along the Merritt Parkway. Today the club has 53 members, and their passion and mission remain the same: to further interest in and knowledge of gardening, horticulture, landscaping, and floral design; participate in civic beautification and promote conservation and environmental education. These days you may find members at work at the entrance to Compo Beach or visit the Nevada Hitchcock Garden at the corner of Cross Highway and Weston Road, Grace K. Salmon Park on Imperial Avenue, or Cam’s Garden in Old Hill on Winding Lane.
Photos By J.C. Martin For WestportLocalPress.com Click on an image to enlarge and open gallery.
For more information about the Westport Garden Club, visit: WestportGardenClub.org