Botanical Illustration: Evergreens (Online)

Wednesday, November 29 - Wednesday, December 13

Join local artist Katharine Dickinson for an introduction to depicting and representing plants’ character, form and colour accurately. Explore drawing plants’ aesthetic and botanical aspects while enhancing your observation and artistic skills in this three-session series.

Learn essential techniques through engaging exercises like gesture and contour line drawing, practice foreshortening and perspective and add tones to show the object. Experiment with watercolour washes and master the art of mixing colours to match the natural shades of specimens. Capture their beauty with delicate dry brush texture markings.

The Home Gardening Series (Online)

Tuesday, January 16 2024 - Tuesday, March 19 2024

Presented by VBGA & Vancouver Master Gardeners

January 16th to March 19th (Tuesdays or Saturdays)

⭐ This wide-ranging 8-session series is the ultimate opportunity to expand your home gardening knowledge through lectures from some of Southern BC’s most highly regarded gardening experts, covering an array of relevant topics for beginner and seasoned gardeners alike.

The Home Gardening Series will cover essential gardening principles, spanning a diverse range of topics, providing a flexible and impactful partial offering of the Master Gardener training course suitable for beginner and seasoned gardeners alike.

Participants in the Home Gardening Series will have a unique opportunity to attend select Master Gardener Basic Training lectures on gardening fundamentals.

Learn More

Speaker Series: The Overlooked Medicine Cabinet - Medicinal Plants in Horticulture (Online)

Tuesday, January 23 2024 6.30pm - 7.30pm

Topic: The Overlooked Medicine Cabinet – Medicinal Plants in Horticulture (Online)

Presenter: Christiaan Spangenberg

Medicinal plants are everywhere in our lives, but we don’t often realize it: dandelions grow by the roadside, we drink peppermint tea in cafés, and buy bouquets with safflower and sweet Annie. Ornamental horticulture is similar: a wide variety of medicinal plants can be found as aesthetic specimens in gardens and nurseries, but their traditional medical uses and curative properties are unadvertised, and often unknown.

Getting a Head Start on Veggie Garden Planning

Friday, January 26 2024 2.00pm - 4.30pm

Get a head start on the 2024 growing season with Jenna Jaski, Co-owner of Victory Gardens. Participants will learn how to plan their garden in terms of deciding what crops to grow, when to plant by seed or start, and how to maximize their space. We will also discuss crop rotation and garden mapping, with the goal of increasing your crop yields and growing success next season. Bring your questions, as there may be time for Q & A at the end of the session!

Winter Plant ID: Ornamental Shrubs & Trees

Saturday, January 27 2024 10.00am - 12.00pm

When seasons change and plants lose their leaves, it may seem like a dull and sleepy time of year— but there is much to observe and get excited about the outdoors! In fact, there are some plant traits that you can only clearly observe in winter.

Wintertime is a great time to build your plant identification skills and hone your observational abilities. In this session, we will begin with an indoor lecture where you will learn the basics of winter plant identification, including key traits and terms. The second part of the class will be an outdoor walk around the garden, where we will stop and observe the interesting features of various Ornamental Shrubs and trees.