Starting tomorrow, March 11th with a welcoming “happy hour”, Great Grow Along will take off as an ambitious 10-day virtual festival, covering Small Space Saturday through Sustainability Sunday; Make It Monday (DIY); Transformation Tuesday; Garden for Wildlife Wednesday and more through March 20th. Amongst its diverse and interesting presenters will also be virtual tours of Chanticleer (shown at top), Cheekwood, Naples Caribbean Gardens Franklin Park Conservatory Filoli. These virtual tours kick-start all five weekday sessions at GGA this year!
Did I say all this is free? Regular conference attendees (I regularly attend art, journalism, and gardening events), know that conferences can often be costly affairs with registration fees and hotel stays being top of mind costs. Because Great Grow Along is virtual and bypasses these expenses altogether, participants simply pay $29.95 for accessing videotaped sessions after live events have concluded.
Tallamy’s 2021 Presentation
Are we unusually promotional with this post on GGA here at the Rant? Yes, but I feel they deserve promotion. Gardeners who can’t travel across the United States for expert gardening education like Doug Tallamy of Gardening for Wildlife fame, Slow Flower Society founder Debra Prinzing and Epic Gardening author Kevin Espiritu can learn from this event–just three of over 30 presenters–at one central site, all week. I must confess to not knowing many of the featured speakers at the Garden Conference, particularly given the large presence of younger gardening professionals who have made their mark through YouTube, podcasts, or Instagram. Although I am used to attending talks by authors with published works, a large proportion of gardeners do not learn that way. GGA provides an engaging alternative for online learning that isn’t served by Facebook’s chaos, while houseplant enthusiasts also enjoy socializing over houseplants at six 8 p.m. happy hour sessions a month!
I think the five tours are an invaluable component, mimicking traditional gardening conferences while providing an exciting, inspirational element.
LaManda Joy, of City Grange nurseries in Chicago, is behind The Great Grow Along Festival. In an interview with Chicago TV, Joy stated that this festival is intended for “16 million new gardeners who started gardening since 2020”. Here’s our post from that first festival held last year!
Final Disclaimer: Though I will be giving a regional gardening talk (roughly Northeast/Midwest) on the final day, this post isn’t meant as promotion; rather, this event fills an unmet need: we needed something fun, inspiring and educational before spring garden shows went away in 2020-21; with no physical conference of this size happening this year (or ever), how could so many experts gather under one roof without cost? Impossible!
