April 19, 2007

Patti Dallas, left, and Marianne MacQueen will facilitate a Friday journaliing workshop called “Living Your Legend,” which is designed to help participants share their life stories. The sessions run from April 20 through May 11.

By Tara Miller

Sherryl Kostic of “would you, could you” In a Frame was tired of winter, ready for spring, and she was looking for something to “bust us into a new season,” she said. And then she thought of that Ricky Nelson song, “Garden Party,” about meeting with old friends. Her old friends, she said, are people who visit her store at 113 Corry Street and the artists whose work she features there. And that gave her the idea for an event featuring the perennial sign of spring: flowers.

“Flowers are something that would get me out,” she said.

Yellow Springs’ own Garden Party is planned for April 27, 6–9 p.m., when local artists and downtown merchants will stay open late and present flower-related displays in their stores. It isn’t just her event, she said, but one that she hopes other villagers and store owners will participate in as well. Several merchants are excited about the idea and are planning their own activities and specials.

Gregory Frank, of Gregory’s Studio of Wonder at 136 Dayton Street, will feature furniture and trays decorated with painted flowers, metal sculpture flowers as well as live plants and a series of flower-themed paintings. Frank also has a sidewalk fountain that bubbles merrily and is surrounded by plants.

Nancy Mellon, of Village Artisans, 100 Corry Street, envisions “flowers, food, and fun” in the gallery with flowers made of fabric, paper, wood and on cards. She will display the work of 20 different artists and plans to serve pink lemonade and flower cookies. Several other artists will join Mellon in the shop to make flower toe or finger rings, and they may have a small gift for those who come wearing flowers or spring hats. It will be an evening “of general lunacy and fun,” she said.

The owners of Glen Garden Gifts will create artsy still-life flower displays for the event and will have locally grown fresh flowers such as gerbera daisies and lilies available for shoppers. They will still offer their regular Friday Flower Happy Hour and will stay open until 9.

Garden Art and Gifts in Kings Yard already carries many flower-related products, including silk flower arrangements created by Roger Hart, fountains, urns, wind chimes, art for gardens, concrete faces for fences and porches.

Mitch George will have his new garden and plant shop, Village Greenery, open in King’s Yard for the event. Epic Books will have flowers, and Ye Olde Trail Tavern will put out flowers, “if it stops snowing,” tavern owner Kathy Christiansen said.

Kostic plans to display flower pins, live bouquets displayed as art and large colorful silk-screened flowers coated in a latex plastic, as well as flowering art by local residents Corrine Bayraktaroglu, Ann Gayek, Kathy Wilson and Lee Funderberg. Urbana artist Paul Reif will have a series of iris paintings on display, and Kettering artist Elizabeth Martin will display her work. Kostic also hopes to create a “flower canopy” outside her shop, she said, adding that during the week of the event other ideas would likely come to her. She will have refreshments and plans to keep all the artwork on display in her store through May 12.

So, as Nelson’s song goes, come to the garden party to reminisce with old friends, share old memories and play our songs again.