Speakers

Oron Peri
Oron Peri was born in Jerusalem where his family has been living for many generations.

Panayoti Kelaidis
Panayoti Kelaidis is a plant explorer, gardener and public garden administrator associated with Denver Botanic Gardens where he is now Senior Curator and Director of Outreach.

Paul Spriggs
Paul Spriggs has been rock gardening for roughly 22 years and building crevice gardens for about 15 years.
He is an avid plant explorer, photographer, mountaineer, owner of Spriggs Gardens Landscaping company, and current President of the Vancouver Island Rock and Alpine Garden Society. He has a passion for all wild plants especially those of dwarf stature and collects and cultivates them at various gardens in his hometown of Victoria, BC, Canada. Paul has learned the craft of crevice garden building directly from one of it’s innovators, Zdenek Zvolanek, of the Czech republic, and in the past decade and a half, has built many gardens in public parks and private homes that range in size from small feature troughs, to large installations involving many tonnes of stone. Paul is passionate about spreading the word of this style, through speaking to garden clubs all over the west, and by giving workshops for those keen on learning the finer points of this developing art form. He is currently working on the first North-American book about crevice gardens with Co-author Kenton Seth.
Presentations:
2020 - 11 | Grand Tour - Crevice Gardens of the Czech Republic |
2023 - 09 | My Favourite Crevice Garden Plants |

Paul Zammit
Bio: Paul Zammit, a graduate of the University of Guelph, is the Nancy Eaton Director of Horticulture at the Toronto Botanical Garden.

Peter Korn
Web Site: http://www.peterkornstradgard.se

Peter Zale
Peter Zale, Ph.D holds a Master’s degree and Ph.D in plant breeding and genetics (2009, 2014) from The Ohio State University

René Giguère
Bio: Rene is newly retired from the Montreal Botanical Garden where he was curator of the alpine garden at for 23 years.

Robert Pavlis
Robert Pavlis is a well-known speaker, and educator with over 40 years of gardening experience. He is the author of several books, Building Natural Ponds, Soil Science for Gardeners and Garden Myths
Sharon and John Bowler
Sharon and John Bowler are members of the Grimsby Garden Club and the Ontario Rock Garden and Hardy Plant Society.

Susan Chater
As she describes herself, Susan Chater was born in England with a gardening grandmother who enriched her life with a love of gardening.