Help us maintain our ‘garden district’

Posted 11/9/23

By now you may have received an envelope in the mail from the Chestnut Hill Garden District Fund.

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Help us maintain our ‘garden district’

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By now you may have received an envelope in the mail from the Chestnut Hill Garden District Fund, the nonprofit organization that so many of you have supported since its founding nearly a quarter century ago. If you haven’t opened it yet, you can probably guess what’s inside. It’s our annual fundraising appeal.

Like you, I receive plenty of appeals at this time of year, so I know what it means to the recipient. No matter how worthy the cause or how heartfelt the ask, it can be numbing. As president of the Chestnut Hill Garden District Fund, I want to cut through that noise and tell you more about who we are, how we make Chestnut Hill beautiful and how your support makes it happen.

Since 1999, the Chestnut Hill Garden District Fund has been tirelessly dedicated to the beautification of Chestnut Hill, a community famous for its colorful flower plantings along Germantown Avenue and beyond, all maintained by our volunteers and staff.

When you walk on the Avenue to shop, eat or meet friends and see arrangements of flowers cascading from hanging baskets on the lampposts above you? We designed, planted and maintained them. The dozens of window boxes and sidewalk barrels in front of businesses on the Avenue and parts of Bethlehem Pike and Evergreen Avenue that explode with the colors of flowering annuals every year? We designed, planted and maintained those too. Ever marveled at the flowers in Peace Park, Cliff Park or Memorial Park at the base of the Hill, or around the welcome signs that greet visitors? Yes, we dirtied our hands making those happen as well.

Every one of the thousands of flowers we’ve planted on the Hill was made possible through a combination of your donations and the expertise and muscle of our volunteers, many of whom no doubt live within a few blocks of you. So when you see our envelope, please consider opening it and making a donation to the Chestnut Hill Garden District Fund. Then, when you see the flowers our volunteers plant in baskets, barrels, boxes and parks next spring, you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing that you helped bring a little bit more color and joy to this neighborhood we all love so much.

Emily Daeschler

President

Chestnut Hill Garden District Fund