Deborah Kent

Gardening has been a lifelong hobby that I have turned into a second career.  My years of hands-on trial and error on my own acre have been bolstered by hundreds of hours of seminars and training.  In 2005 I became a certified master gardener.  I am currently President of Glastonbury Partners in Planting, Inc., a non-profit organization that focuses on horticultural education and beautification in Glastonbury, CT.  As a founding Board member, I have designed the gardens at a low-income senior housing project and a highway median garden at Route 17 and Buttonball in Glastonbury.

My company specializes in home garden design and no job is too small.  How much I do for you depends on your needs.  Are you a ‘do-it yourselfer’?  I can provide a site plan with specific instructions and a list of plants you can take to the garden center.  If you’d like coaching on the proper techniques for planting as well as the care of trees, shrubs, perennials, annuals, and vines, you can hire me as your hands-on coach.  Perhaps all you need is an on-site consultation to give you ideas to improve your landscape - what to keep, how to create some drama, how to better use areas of your yard.  Or I can take over the whole job and leave you with a garden to enjoy from inside and outside your home.

Ms. Myers

Melinda Myers, best known for her gardener friendly and practical approach to gardening, has more than 25 years of horticulture experience in both hands-on and instructional settings. She has a bachelor’s degree in horticulture from The Ohio State University and a master’s degree in horticulture from University of Wisconsin-Madison, is a certified arborist, and was a horticulture instructor with tenure at Milwaukee Area Technical College.

Outside the classroom, Melinda shares her expertise through a variety of media outlets. She has written 19 books, including Can’t Miss Small Space Gardening, the Birds & Blooms’ Ultimate Gardening Guide, and Jackson and Perkins’ Beautiful Roses Made Easy: Midwestern Edition. She hosts “Great Lakes Gardener,” seen on PBS stations throughout the United States, and “Melinda’s Garden Moments”, which air on network television stations throughout the country. She also appears regularly as a guest expert on various national and local television and radio shows. She writes the twice monthly “Gardeners’ Questions” newspaper column and is a contributing editor and columnist for Birds & Blooms and Backyard Living magazines. Melinda has also written articles for Better Homes and Gardens and Fine Gardening magazines. Additionally, she hosted “The Plant Doctor” radio program for over 20 years.

For her work, community service and media presence, Melinda has received recognition and numerous awards, including the 2003 Garden Globe Award for radio talent and the Quill and Trowel Award for her television work, both from the Garden Writers Association. She has also received the Garden Communicator’s Award from the American Nursery and Landscape Association, the Gold Leaf Award for Arbor Day from the International Society of Arboriculture, as well as the 2005 Honorary Life Membership Award from the Wisconsin Arborist Association.

For more information, please visit Myers’ web site www.melindamyers.com. The site features regularly updated garden tips, podcasts, a garden club, e-newsletter, books, appearance information, “Great Lakes Gardener” television schedule and more.

Author and designer Penelope O’Sullivan has written 12 books and numerous articles for magazines, including Better Homes & Gardens, Traditional Home, Country Home, Perennials, Flower Gardening, and The Designer: Journal for the Association of Professional Landscape Designers. She is a member and past regional director of the Garden Writers Association. Her design criticism earned an American Planning Association Journalism Award for outstanding journalism in the advancement of city and regional planning. In addition to designing gardens, Penny lectures on plants and garden design around the country, and scouts locations for Better Homes & Gardens Special Interest Media.

A former Delaware and New Hampshire master gardener, she earned a certificate in ornamental horticulture from Longwood Gardens in Pennsylvania and attended the Radcliffe Seminars, Cambridge, Massachusetts, in landscape design. She holds a bachelor’s degree in fine arts and art history from the University of Pennsylvania and a master’s degree in art history from the University of Delaware. Penny, under the byline Penelope Bass Cope, was a columnist and arts and entertainment reporter for The News Journal in Wilmington, Delaware before making gardens her career. She lives with her family in the seacoast region of New Hampshire.

Cynthia A. Cormier
21 Beverly Road
West Hartford, CT 06119
236.7964

Ms. Cormier has been in the museum field for over twenty years. She obtained her Master’s Degree in art history from the University of Massachusetts and began her museum career with an internship in the Wadsworth Atheneum’s Department of American Decorative Arts. She then served as curator at Wistariahurst Museum in Holyoke, Massachusetts, an 1870s Victorian mansion that was once the home of city silk manufacturers. As curator of one of the city’s architectural gems, Cormier helped establish long range goals for care of the museum’s buildings and grounds, over saw the museum special exhibition program and acted as the museum’s Collection Manager. From Wistariahurst, Cormier went to the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, CT, working for nearly 10 years in the museum’s Education Department. Through the oversight of the Wadsworth’s many public programs and management of its volunteer docent corps, Cormier developed her passion for engaging the public, young and old alike, in conversation with great works of art.

From the Atheneum she went to the Hill-Stead Museum in Farmington, CT to oversee both the education and curatorial departments. At Hill-Stead, Cormier is involved in both the day-to-day managing and interpreting museum’s varied collections that include--10 historic buildings, a 150-acre designed cultural landscape and 3,500 objects. She also is involved in helping to shape the museum’s future directions, while working to ensure that the museum and grounds remain as they were over 100 years ago. Balancing the preservation and curatorial needs of Hill-Stead’s art, architecture and green space with the increasing public interest in the site is job she relishes.

Cormier lives in West Hartford, CT with her husband and two daughters. When not at Hill-Stead, she spend time working on her 1915 Arts & Crafts-style bungalow, gardening, volunteering at her daughters’ schools, or taking long walks in the woods. She’s also a part of the editorial team that publishes a quarterly magazine, called Hog River Journal--committed to exploring CT history, one good story after another.

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Bill Matthews