At our October 12 meeting, more than 120 members and guests enjoyed a fascinating presentation by Donald Olson — “Garden Goddesses: Four California Women and their Legendary Gardens.” He introduced us to remarkable women who created spectacular California gardens from 1900-1950:
– Kate Sessions, “Mother of Balboa Park” in San Diego
– Virginia Dryden Robinson, “Queen of Beverly Hills”
– Ganna Walska, Developer of “Lotusland Gardens” in Montecito
– Florence Yoch, First female landscape architect on West Coast
Mr. Olson is a passionate gardener and garden lover and has written The California Garden Tour and the Pacific Northwest Garden Tour. He sold many of these books after his presentation and signed them for eager members who loved his talk.
The night before the meeting, the garden club Board treated Mr. Olson to a cocktail party at President Nancy Englund’s home to welcome him as the club’s featured speaker.
In addition to writing garden travel guides, Mr. Olson has penned best-selling travel guides, such as Frommer’s Portland Day-by-Day, Seattle Day-by-Day and Easy Guide to Seattle, Portland and the Oregon Coast. He has also written travel articles for the New York Times, National Geographic and other publications as well as novels and plays
To learn more about this this well-versed writer and popular speaker on garden topics, please visit DonaldStevenOlson.
Please click on any photo below to look through the album.
