Camden Garden Club wil host their inaugural Garden Expo, “Edible Gardens & Bountiful Tables,” on Thursday, July 17, 2025. The day-long event will feature speakers Barbara Damrosch and Nancy Harmon Jenkins, as well as a PechaKucha-style presentation, horticultural demonstrations, tablescape displays, and a micro-farm tour. Most activities will take place at the Camden-Rockport Middle School at 34 Knowlton Street in Camden. Expo tickets are $40 and will be available on camdengardenclub.org beginning starting tomorrow. There will be a limit of 200 tickets. 

The day will begin with a PechaKucha-style presentation featuring local horticulturalists. Rory Keohane from Tenderwild Farm will speak about farms as infrastructure for community, Charlie Costello from MariLark Farms will discuss the importance of Heirlooms, Hannah Semler from FarmDrop will talk about gleaners and garnering resources, and Melissa Kelly, James Beard Award-winning executive chef and owner of Primo, will speak about growing vegetables with "simplicity, seasonality, and freshness" on the restaurant’s farm. PechaKucha is a Japanese-originated format where speakers address the audience using 20 slides, each displayed for 20 seconds, resulting in a concise 6-minute and 40-second presentation, emphasizing visual storytelling and brevity. After a short break, Barbara and Nancy will give the keynote addresses, followed by a book signing. Expo participants may bring their own or purchase from a selection provided by Left Bank Books.

The morning will wrap up with a series of horticultural demonstrations, with Expo participants selecting two of four offerings: Josh Hixon, chef and former owner of 40 Paper, will make three herb sauces; John Fromer of Merryspring Gardens will discuss kitchen garden designs; Stacy Leafsong of Leafsong Family Farm will make bouquets; and Caleb Goosen of MOFGA will consider the perfect soil combination for garden development. The afternoon will conclude with a tour of David Kibbe’s Old Souls Farm in Camden. David focuses on regenerative practices, seasonal crops, and community connection in this small-scale, ecologically-minded growing space of .74 acres in the historic Chestnut Street neighborhood. His work integrates hands-on cultivation with soil health, native plantings, biodiversity, and climate resilience, aiming to provide nourishing food while cultivating a deeper relationship with the land. He grows vegetables and native flowering perennials, tends honey bees and a small flock of chickens, and manages a small apple, peach, and pear tree orchard.  David’s permacultural practices include bioswales, hugelkultur, meadows, and active composting.

This will be an exciting day of meeting and learning from a spirited group of local growers, authors and creatives, with a shared message, Grow, Conserve, Respect while dancing to the tune of Mother Nature.