Highlights From Twilight 2025

On a warm spring evening, we celebrated our annual Twilight in the Garden event which helps fund projects in the garden as well as maintenance. Delicious food was provided by Cribbs Kitchen. Besides the live and silent auctions, presentations were made for the Noble Trees of Spartanburg County contest, the unveiling of the sculpture of Major and the Barrie Bain Volunteer of the Year award recipients.

This is the fourth year The Noble Tree Foundation of Spartanburg County has awarded Hatcher Garden with checks based on the selection of the winning and honorable mention Noble Tree entries. Bruce Fraedrich of the Noble Tree Foundation announced this year’s winner: a Coastal Redwood (Sequoia sempivirens) located in the city of Inman. Go to the Noble Tree Contest page to view the other trees that selected for recognition. And get out there and nominate a Noble Tree for next year’s contest! The Noble Tree Foundation was formed in 1999 by Roger Milliken with the mission to promote the education and activities of the people of Spartanburg County relating to the knowledge and planting of Noble Trees, landscaping, and alignment of projects that help beautify the broader community.

At last year’s Twilight in the Garden, there was a flash auction to raise money for a sculpture of the Executive Director’s beloved dog, Major, to be placed in the Children’s Garden. The unofficial mascot of Hatcher Garden, she can be seen daily roaming in the garden greeting visitors. The sculpture of Major, fashioned by the artist Cory Bissom, was unveiled at the event. The metal sculpture will be placed in the Children’s Garden where she will stand guard over the recently completed sand garden located in front of the maintenance shed.

Also part of the presentations was the annual Barrie Bain Volunteer of the Year Award, recognizing our hard working volunteers. This year’s recipients are Elliot Mahan (picture above) and Diane Orzechowski . Elliot was recognized for the countless hours of coming in to help lay and cut pavers for the new sensory path (Children’s Garden), helping with the Hurricane Helene cleanup, and for his donation of free IT help and photos that are being sold in the gift shop. Diane Orzechowski was recognized for volunteering to do the daunting task of creating a database of all the plants currently growing in the nursery that can be accessed by all, cataloging them by Latin names, common names, photos and planting information.

Photographs for this event were kindly provided by Amy and Mike from Spartan Photo.