plant boy
My first memory of a plant-based experience is the blooming of a hyacinth. I don’t remember planting it. I guess I shoved the bulb into a wooden raised bed out front of our rented house? I do remember the eastern morning, 5 months later, when it broke open - stinky and white. I still love hyacinths. Any bulb, honestly.
It was only a few years later when I started writing about plants. I used Microsoft Publisher [sophisticated, I know] to pull together text and photos for The Garden Chronicle. I still have a few print copy of the first 3 issues. Not long after that, I started writing for a couple of regional gardening publications. After that - people can’t get me to shut up.
I wanted to write, but journalism and the print industry didn’t seem too promising in 2009. My parents thought a job with “architect” in the name sounded respectable - so off I went to train as a landscape architect.
5 years of design school changed me.
I learned how to think like a designer. I learned the technical skills necessary to practice as a landscape architect. I got SO familiar with prairie.
Since then, I’ve lived a few different places - had a few different jobs.
I started by working for a design-build firm on Sanibel and Captiva in south Florida. Then I worked for 3 years for P. Allen Smith & Associates - we designed fine gardens and estates throughout the southern US. After PASA, I worked for ASA Engineering in Chattanooga, TN. I took my tests and became a registered landscape architect. In 2020, I started working with Coastal Vista Design. I’m currently a licensed landscape architect and project manager for CVD focusing on planting design for the Gulf Coast and beyond.
I still write. You can check on what I’m up to here: what I’m doing now
