On the QT | The Official Newsletter of GWA October-November 2016 | Page 9

Celebrity Crushing at GWA Expo
BY CHRISTOPHER FREIMUTH

PHOTO COURTESY CAITLIN NORTON

I

t’s strange, interacting with celebrities.
Nobody wants to be the drooling idiot
falling over famous people, right? None
of us is proud of our selfie sticks or the
way we whip them out when we see a
VIP. I doubt that celebrities are particularly impressed by, you know, stalkers.
And yet you and I both know that sometimes
you just gotta drool, sometimes you gotta get
out that phone camera, and sometimes you
gotta discreetly follow photographer Rob
Cardillo around the back of a house tour in
Atlanta to see what he’s doing. I mean, it’s Rob
Cardillo. Like, the Rob Cardillo.
That, in a nutshell, sums up my experience as a
newbie at the GWA Conference & Expo in Atlanta
this September. I went down one hall and saw
the tag team who wrote the perennials book
from which I first learned about my true love—
gaura. Turned around and bumped into the folks
who planted a million daffodils at my very own
New York Botanical Garden last year. Walked up
the stairs and shook hands with the editor of
Timber Press whose books fill my shelves.
Everywhere I looked, I saw somebody I’d
either heard of or wanted to hear from. To me,
all of the people in attendance were celebrities
because they were all successfully engaged in
the type of work I admire. I walked in the door
to the conference on Friday afternoon and
was immediately met by a crowd of incredibly
interesting, well-versed and successful garden
communicators whose books I’ve read, blogs
I’ve followed and photographs I’ve appreciated.
These were people I’d known as the authors
of my textbooks and names I’d thrown around
among peers in order to sound smart. I was
ecstatic when Maria Zampini gave me her
autograph.
Don’t get me wrong; I’ve met celebrities
before. Back in 2007, I was in a football stadium
in New Jersey (I swear this is true) and walked
right by Al Gore. I immediately yelped out his
name. He actually turned around and made eye
contact with me…then kept walking. When I
was in my teens, I walked by Lisa Loeb at a Lilith
Fair show in Connecticut. We smiled at one
another and I nearly fainted.

A donor, who wishes to remain anonymous, supported a young professional’s attendance at the GWA
Conference & Expo in Atlanta. Chris Freimuth’s essay about garden communications earned him the spot.

The thing about the GWA conference, and
why I keep harping on this cheesy celebrity
through line, is that all of these people I admire
didn’t just nod th eir heads and keep
walking. Throughout the conference, everyone
I met was unconditionally and relentlessly open
and generous with their attention and support.
People were excited to give me their cards.
They were eager to get mine. This GWA crowd,
I’ve found, has a five-star rating: intelligent,
creative, driven, connected and kind. As someone who is entering this field as a second
career (in earlier years I was a licensed massage
therapist in San Francisco) this kind of warm
welcome is especially meaningful.
Throughout the four days I spent with the
communicators in Atlanta, we attended
roundtables and lectures, went on garden tours
and spent ample time talking and networking in and around the Expo. Kathy Jentz led an
informative roundtable on social media, helping
us to see the collective benefits we can all share
through being connected online. Brie Arthur
gave an inspiring call to arms about foodscaping.
Dan Benarcik (Go Team Chanticleer!) spoke—
provocative as ever—about our garden’s pro-

gressive designs and processes. And of course,
Michael Dirr gave an action-packed keynote on
—what else—trees!
Throughout and within it all, we connected.
We chatted, chatted, chatted, exchanged
information and asked one another how we
could help each other. I came back to
Chanticleer, where I’m just finishing up an
internship as part of my training at NYBG’s
School of Professional Horticulture, with dozens
of new contacts and inspiration for my work
in urban garden design. During the coming
weeks, I’ll be back in New York City, plugging
into GWA from there and figuring out how
to become a more active and effective
member.
In short: GWA rocks. I drank the Kool-Aid.
It was delicious. I want more.
Christopher Freimuth is a gardener and landscape
designer based in New York City. As a student at
New York Botanical Garden’s School of Professional
Horticulture, he spent the last six months interning at
Chanticleer Garden in Wayne, Pennsylvania. To learn
more, visit www.cwfreimuth.com or follow him on
Instagram at @cwfreimuth.

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