Rodney Eason
director of horticulture and landscape, boston, massachusetts
As Director of Horticulture & Landscape at the Arnold Arboretum, Rodney's role is to lead the horticultural care and design of Harvard’s museum of living trees. He spent the first 30-ish years living in North Carolina but has discovered a new home, along with his wife, Carrie, in New England. They spent the past 11 years living, working, and raising four kids in Maine. He is excited to begin this new chapter living and working in Boston. Aside from geeking out about plants and design, Rodney enjoys gardening, starting home improvement projects, and going on long bike rides to avoid finishing these projects.
lecture:
Design to Fit the Site
Rodney will speak about one of his landscape design heroes, Beatrix Farrand. Two of his favorite gardens, Dumbarton Oaks and the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Garden, were designed by Farrand (note: she also served as a landscape advisor for the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University where Rodney now works). Ms. Farrand was the rare talent who understood how to combine landscape design with sublime perennial plant selections. He will illustrate several time-tested landscape and planting design elements from Farrand, including the important principle of designing to fit the site rather than altering a site to fit the design.