1. Actions including stimulating a knowledge and love of gardening amongst amateurs
2. Actions including aiding in the protection of native plants, trees, birds and soil
3. Actions including taking an interest in civic planting
4. Actions including sharing the wonder of nature through education, engagement, and creativity
5. Actions including inspiring our community through a focus on floral artistry, horticulture, and environmental projects with a commitment to education and charitable initiatives

Since 1946, the Garden Club of Toronto (GCT) has pioneered major horticultural, garden-related, floral artistry, environmental and educational projects. True to its vision of sharing the wonder of nature through education, engagement and creativity, GCT stimulates a knowledge and love of gardening among amateurs; aids in the protection of native plants, trees, birds and soil; and has contributed to civic planting.

GCT played a major role in the creation of the Toronto Botanical Garden (formerly The Civic Garden Centre) and co-founded the annual Canada Blooms event. GCT counts among its more than 50 garden projects the Gardens of Casa Loma, the 19^th Century Garden in St. James Park, and the Teaching Garden in the Toronto Botanical Garden. A registered charity, GCT has contributed close to $9 million in current dollars to all its projects. 

More about Our History

• To stimulate a knowledge and love of gardening amongst amateurs
• To aid in the protection of native plants, birds, trees and soil
• To encourage civic planting

• Annual Report 2022-2023
• Annual Report 2021-2022
• Annual Report 2020-2021
• Statement on Equality, Diversity and Inclusion
  

SCHOLARSHIPS

One of the Garden Club of Toronto's most important aims is to promote a love for the environment. Our emphasis is on horticultural knowledge, landscape design and plant conservation. 

POST SECONDARY

Through our Scholarship Program, we assist students enrolled in Horticulture,  Landscape Design, and Landscape Architecture programs in four post-secondary institutions in southern Ontario.  Using criteria set by the Garden Cub of Toronto, Faculty members from Humber Polytechnic in Etobicoke, Fanshawe College in London, the University of Guelph, and the John H. Daniels Faculty of Landscape, Architecture, and Design at the University of Toronto select the award recipients.  In addition to the financial award, students receive a one-year membership to the Toronto Botanical Garden, and are invited to attend the Garden Club general meeting and luncheon in April.  At the meeting, they are introduced to GCT members who are always thrilled to hear about the students’ accomplishments and career aspirations.

PRIMARY SCHOOL 


   The Green Explorers Camp Toronto Botanical Garden $500


Since 1988, the Toronto Botanical Garden has offered school and recreational programmes conducted in the Teaching Garden at Edwards Gardens, designed to stimulate children's curiosity about nature and gardening through hands-on activities. The Green Explorers Camp offers scholarships to students from Flemingdon Park, a designated high-priority neighbourhood and one of Canada’s highest density neighbourhoods the chance to learn environmental leadership skills while exploring Toronto’s greenspaces and gardens on foot, bicycle and public transit. The scholarship spots are generously funded by donors like the Garden Club of Toronto who are committed to providing Toronto’s urban youth with hands-on nature experiences. 

Our History

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The Garden Club of Toronto was formed in November 1946 by a group of women who had worked together throughout World War II at the Red Cross Canteen on Adelaide St. They patterned their aims after those of the very successful and highly respected Garden Club of America, formed in 1913.

In 1947 the Garden Club of Toronto was granted a charter by the Province of Ontario. The Club immediately affirmed its commitment to flower shows and public service. In that first full year of operation, the Club created flower arrangements to enhance the Hogarth exhibition at the Art Gallery and responded to a first project request with a donation toward the gardens at historic Barnum House in Cobourg.

Garden Club of Toronto members organized major flower shows annually from 1947 to 1997 at venues that included the Royal Winter Fair, Casa Loma and the Civic Garden Centre, now known as the Toronto Botanical Garden. In 1997, the Garden Club of Toronto, with Landscape Ontario, sponsored the first Canada Blooms Flower Show. Both organizations continue to play major roles in this annual flower show and festival.

In tandem with the members’ interest in flower shows was their concern with specific garden projects. The first major project, in 1954, was the planning and planting of the Fragrant Garden for the blind at the Canadian National Institute for the Blind. Others followed, including the establishment of the Civic Garden Centre, today's Toronto Botanical Garden. The opening of June Callwood Park in 2014 marked another successful Garden Club of Toronto project. Find more information about Garden Club Projects.

Other achievements include the 1958 formation, along with garden clubs in London and Hamilton, of a provincial group called The Garden Clubs of Ontario. Through The Garden Clubs of Ontario, our members helped to form The World Association of Flower Arrangers, a membership of national organizations from thirty countries. WAFA is hosted on a three year term by an elected member country. During its tenure, the host country is responsible for organizing and hosting a World Flower Show. The fourth World Flower Show was hosted by Canadian garden clubs and held in Toronto in 1993.

2008 marked the publication of "The Growing Years", written by Helen Skinner, an informative, illustrated account of the events and achievements of the Garden Club of Toronto from 1946-2007. This hardcover volume is available for purchase here.