This Week's Podcast: An Extravagant Showman puts on a "Brilliant" Show
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Our guest this week is Chris Woods, a native of England, who has
worked in horticulture for 30 years. He emigrated to the US to begin working on
Chanticleer, in Wayne, Pennsylvania, in 1981. He directed the creation of this
“pleasure garden” that is now known as one of the most exuberant, artistic and romantic
public gardens in America.
He then crossed the country stopping at various
positions — as the Vice President for Horticulture at the Santa Barbara Botanical
Garden, and the Executive Director of the Mendocino Coast Botanical Garden.
Now, he is back in the Philadelphia area as the Director of Meadowbrook Farm,
the late J. Liddon Pennock’s nursery, which was bequeathed to the Pennsylvania
Horticultural Society (PHS) in 2004.
The Society puts on the Philadelphia Flower Show, the biggest and
most successful show of its kind in the United States, which is visited by over
a quarter of a million people each March.
The theme for this year’s flower show is “Brilliant,” which is PHS’s
take on England today. Chris is a member of the design team for the show’s central feature – “Big
Ben” — a modern interpretation of the four-faced clock in London (shown during
construction before the opening, below).
Chris is going to tell us about his recent work
and give us a taste of the 2013 Philadelphia Flower Show, which runs from
March 1 to 10.
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