Messervy’s industry expertise, work and books have been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Organic Gardening, House & Garden, Elle Decor, Vogue, Garden Design and numerous other leading print and online media around the world. She has lectured at distinguished venues such as the Smithsonian Institution, the National Geographic Society, and the Getty Museum.
Possible topics for lectures include:
LANDSCAPING IDEAS THAT WORK
In the age of ubiquitous digital devices and screens, time and space in the out-of-doors are essential to our physical, mental, and even spiritual health. One way to engage with nature is to create a landscape around your house that draws you and your loved ones outside. If you build it, they will come—to bask with a cup of coffee in the early morning rays, to play hopscotch on the driveway, to harvest the ripest tomato along with a snip of basil for a fresh caprese salad, to plant a rose bush, or to catch fireflies in the grassy meadow under the stars. These real-life experiences bring to children and adults alike a deep connection to our earth and a rekindling of spirit that can’t happen any other way.
It’s just not that hard to create a landscape that works. In this inspiring lecture, you’ll see a host of visual ideas as well as design tips, before and after images, case studies, and essential information to get you started. Award-winning landscape designer and author Julie Moir Messervy walks you through the process her firm JMMDS uses, from thinking ‘big picture’ about your property all the way down to the details. Across a wide range of projects, from luxurious spaces to those that were built with sweat equity on a shoestring, you’ll come away with more knowledge about how to create comfortable living spaces in the out-of-doors. (1-1.5 hours)
GET OUT!! Designing Landscapes That Bring Everyone Outside Again
Faced with hectic schedules and distracting digital devices, designers and homeowners need to create enticing, stimulating landscapes where people can connect with nature once more. Join award-winning landscape designer and author Julie Moir Messervy as she describes the five paths she’s taking to help people create and enjoy their outdoor surroundings, illustrating her points with her studio’s wide-ranging residential and institutional projects. Messervy is the author of six books on landscape design, a noted lecturer, and the designer of the Toronto Music Garden and countless public and private landscapes. With a newly released iPhone app and online design service, Julie Moir Messervy Design Studio is pioneering new ways to bring good landscape design to homeowners everywhere. (1-1.5 hours)
HOME OUTSIDE: Creating the Landscape You Love
In this inspiring lecture, award-winning landscape designer and author Julie Moir Messervy demystifies the art and practice of landscape design for homeowners and professionals alike. Using beautiful images, together with helpful tips, case studies, befores and afters, diagrams, and plans, she walks you through the process of turning any property into the “home outside” you’ve always dreamed of. Julie highlights many of the ideas introduced in her book, Home Outside: Creating the Landscape You Love, illustrating that good landscape design does not have to be overwhelming or expensive. (1-1.5 hours)
OUTSIDE THE NOT SO BIG HOUSE: Creating the Landscape of Home
This stimulating presentation by author and noted landscape designer Julie Moir Messervy is based on the book of the same name that she wrote with Not So Big author and architect Sarah Susanka. In it, Julie reveals how to bring house and garden into perfect harmony by giving you the design principles needed to extend the presence of home onto the land. She divides the talk into four parts: embracing the habitat of home; composing journeys; linking the inside with the out; and crafting the elements of nature. Her talk is full of fascinating ideas and images of beautiful and doable landscapes. (1-1.5 hours)
INSPIRED BY BACH: The Music Garden
Celebrated landscape designer Julie Moir Messervy completed the award-winning Toronto Music Garden in 1999–a collaboration with renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma and the City of Toronto. A three-acre public park based on the “First Suite for Unaccompanied Cello” by Johann Sebastian Bach, curving paths move visitors through six garden “movements” that flow from the different moods evoked by the music. In this inspiring lecture, Julie explores the relationship between music and garden design, and how the aesthetic and structural elements in the music influenced her garden vision and her ultimate design choices.
Messervy and the Toronto Music Garden are the subject of the Emmy award-winning PBS film, “Yo-Yo Ma: Inspired by Bach: The Music Garden.” In 2005, the Toronto Music Garden received a Leonardo Da Vinci award for innovation and creativity. (1-1.5 hours)
GARDENS AND SPIRITUALITY
Contemplate the transcendent power of landscape as seen through the eyes of award-winning landscape designer and author Julie Moir Messervy. Julie explores the deeply personal process of designing a beautiful landscape and reveals how spirituality can inform garden design and the landscapes we create on the earth. (1-1.5 hours)