After graduating from college, I spent 4 years as one of three gardeners at Walt Disney World who specialized in topiary production. I spearheaded the effort to take them from just green shrubs to the detailed, colorful, plant-based sculptures you see today by partnering with Disney Imagineering and Feature Animation to improve their looks and to maintain character integrity.
I started by choosing plant materials, planting and maintaining the various topiaries, up to more than 100 individual elements during Epcot’s Flower and Garden Festival. Eventually, I began designing layouts for some of the main festival flower beds and redesigning the actual steel frames.