About Tovah Martin

Tovah MartinIn her constant, undying pursuit of all things garden-related, Tovah gets her hands dirty both outside and indoors. She is a perennial, heirloom, vegetable and cottage gardener of fanatical proportions, and has recently earned her accreditation from NOFA as an Organic Land Care professional. Beyond the garden outdoors, Tovah’s areas of specialty also include decades of experience with tropicals (especially begonias) in windowsills, greenhouses, and otherwise. Her passion for all things growing and encased in glass has led to her most recent book, The New Terrarium (Clarkson Potter/Publishers, 2009). Check out a running listing of her lecture schedule on the “Where I’m At” post on this blog for a talk, demonstration or workshop near you. The terrarium book is the newest publication of more than a dozen titles that Tovah has authored including Tasha Tudor’s Garden (Houghton Mifflin, 1994). Please contact Tovah through www.tovahmartin.com for lecture inquiries.

You can also catch the gardening contagion and read about Tovah’s successes, foibles, and travels through her articles in Country Gardens, Garden Design, at Home magazine, Hobby Farm, Urban Farm, La Vie Claire, Connecticut magazine, Connecticut Cottages & Gardens, Flower magazine, Horticulture, Connecticut Gardener, Coastal Living, Coastal Home, Old House Interiors, Early Homes, Westchester Home & Garden, Country Living, and The Litchfield County Times as well as many other publications. In other media, Tovah has ventured into web content writing. And, in addition to www.plantswise.com, she is a contributing blogger on the team at www.gardeninggonewild.com where her daring blog discusses all things having to do with bulbs. Speaking of bulbs, in www.seasonalwalk.com she followed the progress of a design project by international gardening superstars Piet Oudolf and Jacqueline van der Kloet. Meanwhile, she also continues to blog on terrariums for www.hpotter.blog.net.

Watch Tovah in action on television – she appeared most recently on the January 16, 2011: CBS Sunday Early Show. She has also appeared on the weekly edition of the CBS Early Show, the Victory Garden, the Way to Grow Show, B. Smith with Style as well as many other broadcasts including the PBS television gardening series “Cultivating Life,” where she served as editorial producer.

Tovah is proud to be awarded an Honorary Membership in The Garden Club of America as well as the Litchfield Garden Club. The GCA also awarded Tovah their Sarah Chapman Francis Medal for “outstanding literary achievement.” She was named one of the 50 Most Influential People and one of the top 10 garden educators by People, Places, Plants magazine. In addition, the Massachusetts Horticultural Society honored her with their Gold Medal.

More often than not, you can find Tovah outside working on her 7 acre organic New England property where she tends Saanen goats as well as perennial, berry, vegetable, and herb gardens in addition to umpteen houseplants. You’ll find her wearing a 1950s shirtwaist dress (generally ripped) and Muck boots (or Chuck Taylors when she’s expecting company). As part of her new Lawn Liberation Movement, she has stuffed her ever-expanding, beat-back-the-lawn landscape with plants of every stripe. Read more about that initiative in her blogs…