APLD Members ~ Member of the Month

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APLD Member of the Month – August 2008

Shelley Somersett, APLD
Somersett Designs
Shelley@somersettdesigns.com
www.somersettdesigns.com
Walnut Creek, California

Shelley Somersett, a native Californian, grew up on a ranch in the San Francisco Bay Area amongst rolling hills of wildflowers and ancient Oak trees.  Gardening has been a passion all her life. Shelley received her education in Residential Garden Design at the University of California at Berkeley, Extension. Residing in Contra Costa County and having grown up in Alameda County gives a unique understanding of the SF Bay Area microclimates, horticulture and resources where Shelley has practiced design for over ten years.

• Shelley Somersett is a Certified Professional Member in the Association of Professional Landscape Designers.
• Committed to the advancement of the profession, Shelley currently serves on the Board of Directors of the APLD, California Chapter as Membership Chair for 2008.
• Shelley has served the California APLD members since 2003 as:
  • A founding Member and President of the East Bay District of APLD, 2003-2004
  • California Chapter Vice President in 2005,
  • California Chapter President in 2006
  • California Chapter Representative to the National APLD Board for 2007.

Shelley Somersett is a Silver Medal Garden Creator for the San Francisco Flower and Garden Show 2008 for “It doesn’t take a hectare” an edible garden.

‘It doesn’t take a hectare’ began at an East Bay APLD meeting when Kay Estey, the San Francisco Garden Show Director, visited us with her annual request for designers to consider being a garden creator for the San Francisco Flower and Garden Show. When Kay said “I would like to have an edible garden on the floor this year” my heart leapt. I have long been interested in edible plants being included in the designed landscape. My inner voice said, “you can do that”. My logic said “whoa Nellie”. The vision would not leave my head and the following poem came to me as I considered how I could execute a garden for the show: 

It doesn’t take a hectare to feed a family four square

Heirlooms in the Cottage or on an Urban Roof
Wine Country Tuscan or Berkeley ‘Locavor’
No GMO’s are in our food, the nutrients are proof.

Take some dirt, add sunshine, clean water and fresh air,
A designer for the garden and you’re half way there.
When Edibles are planted, sustainable’s the fare.

Breakfast, lunch and dinner your neighbor too can share
The earth still laughs in flowers, the chef’s gourmet affair
Feed a hungry neighbor, teach the world to share.

.... Shelley Somersett, APLD

I decided that this was a garden I was meant to design for the public to demonstrate the use of edibles in the garden. This is an area of sustainability that is not frequently mentioned in the green movement. How to be water wise and the use of natives and Mediterranean plants is readily available as a move toward a lighter footprint on the landscape continues to gain public interest. How to grow your own food, how to teach children where food comes from, and edibles as an alternative to lawn is beginning to reach the landscape design field. There have been many forward thinkers such as Rosalind Creasy who have challenged the neighborhood front yard design in recent years. Reading Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Paul Hawken’s Blessed Unrest, Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal Vegetable Miracle set the stage for my taking an activist role. Alice Waters and her school garden movement, purchasing local food and cooking fresh food from your own garden has long been an example for me of good stewardship, and of course her latest cook book, Simple Food. Here was the opportunity to combine my passion for gardening, the environment and social justice issues all rolled into one event. Kay Estey had me, hook, line and sinker.

I asked fellow APLD member and CLCA member Warren Leiber if he was interested in partnering with me to build the garden at the show and after explaining my design concept he agreed. We began our collaboration in September of 2007. Warren was a great partner, meeting with me weekly at his yard where we built the garden offsite to be disassembled, transported and reassembled on the floor for the show. Warren was a great partner having designed two gardens himself previously for the SFFGS. Warren Leiber and his crew at Leiber Landscape Services work in Contra Costa and Alameda Counties. Good teamwork is the magic of good garden show gardens.

Where to get show quality vegetable plants that would be large and luscious the first week of March was a challenge. The solution after talking with several local nurseries was growing them myself. So my daughter, Lauren, husband, Bob, and I spent a few days planting seedlings, then potting up over 200 plants into one gallon pots for the show which we grew in two greenhouses in Concord, California. Lauren was veggie nursery woman extraordinaire while staying on top of a demanding job for PG & E. Next challenge was where to find fruit trees that would be in flower for the March show and the answer was Sweet Lane Nursery who had a great selection of B & B trees (a resource that I learned about from an APLD field trip). Flowering as planned the cordoned 20th Century Asian Pear and Fuji Apple were big hits with the public who have smaller and smaller spaces for gardens. By the way be prepared when you design a show garden to answer the same question thousands of times. We had over 40,000 visitors in the garden and most have the same three questions.

Staging the garden was fun because I had selected four design styles to showcase the vegetables and fruit trees. I had to find elements that identified themselves as a specific style. Francesca Agrusa of American Soil & Stone was the first to help with loaning the beautiful Italian terracotta for the wine country garden. Our beautiful stucco wall which Warren’s team built was faux painted by Helen Doronkina. Warren’s team executed a great gothic fence design I gave him and laid a beautiful brick path to the cottage garden vignette. The urban rooftop with its corrugated metal walls and CorTen steel planter beds was a big hit with many for the way it brought the garden to eyelevel. It also was admired by several people who had mobility challenges. It made gardening a possibility that did not require getting down on the ground. The Berkeley garden had beveled glass doors rescued from demolition in the West Portal District of San Francisco and lichen covered boards from a fence demolition in Moraga. But the star was the twelve foot tall metal rabbit sculpture on loan by artist Phil Glashoff for the Berkeley eclectic garden.

The garden vignettes provided the teaching opportunity for thousands of children, yes thousands, who were challenged to find “Which plant is the carrot?” by my husband, Bob. A long time docent for the Lindsay Wildlife Museum, Bob, is in his element when teaching children about the natural world around us.

Many people ask “Was the garden show a success for you?” The answer for me will be a resounding “Yes”. Yes, because I have developed a new friendship with a colleague, Warren Leiber; we have demonstrated how to design with edible plants; we have inspired unknown numbers of children and adults to plant a vegetable garden together; we have demonstrated how to make use of the land, water and sunshine to grow healthy, organic and local food; we demonstrated how to share the excess harvest with your local food bank; because indeed, no one should go hungry and food should never be taken for granted. Yes, in gratitude for the miracle within a tiny seed.

Garden for Life

Sharing gardening experiences is a joy. Shelley is an entertaining speaker on garden topics and was the kick-off speaker at the APLD-California Chapter, East Bay District, Speaker Series in Lafayette, California speaking on "Art in the Garden". These APLD Speaker Series events are open to the public.

Edible plants from your garden:

• are beautiful and healthy to eat;
• have a great teaching opportunity for children about where food comes from, how it is harvested and how to prepare it fresh;
• are sustainable use of land and water resources;
• are a way to ensure your food is locally grown;
• are organically grown to your standards;
• usually are perennial - providing years of service;
• bring pollinators to your garden as well as beauty.

Newspaper article

Eating Locally, as in Growing Your Own
 
In "It Doesn't Take a Hectare," Shelley Somersett has taken the "locavore" eat-local concept and planted a spectacular garden around it. The entire space is planted in edibles, from espaliered pears to Meyer lemons to all manner of vegetables and salad greens. Old doors against the wall suggest rooms beyond, and an inviting bench is draped in a faded antique quilt. A copy of Michael Pollan's "In Defense of Food" ("Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." is the author's manifesto) sits on the garden table. And overseeing all of this is a giant - and I mean giant - sculpture of a rabbit holding a carrot, made from recycled objects by Suisun City sculptor Phillip Glashoff

TwinCities.com – Holly Hayes at Mercury News March 15, 2008

 

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Certified Members seeking to be profiled should send before and after photos with SHORT design intent statement to:

Martin Speece
Email: promote@apld.org
Phone: 717-238-9780

* PHOTOS SHOULD BE CLEAR COLOR PRINTS OR JPEG COMPRESSED FILES