More Than Seeds and Soil: Growing Community Closes Out Another Season at the Anacostia Community Museum

The Anacostia Community Museum’s longest-running program closes out its season with free fall workshops that celebrate the garden as a place of learning, art and community.

Fall in the garden at the Smithsonian’s Anacostia Community Museum is not really an ending.

The last of the summer crops are coming in, the beds are being readied for cooler weather, and the gardeners who have spent the season together are already talking about what they want to plant next year. It is a fitting moment to wrap up another season of Growing Community, the museum’s longstanding community gardening program, with three Saturday workshops that welcome gardeners of every age and experience level.

Growing Community is the museum’s longest-running program, with roots that reach back to the 1980s. Since then, it has given residents of Anacostia and neighborhoods across the District a place to learn practical gardening skills, trade tips, and start gardens of their own at home. For more than a decade, the program has been led by Derek Thomas, whose leadership has helped expand its reach and impact. Through monthly workshops during the growing and harvesting seasons, residents of all ages engage with the beauty of the natural world, a healthy food system, and their cultural past.

“People come to the garden to learn how to grow tomatoes or greens, but they keep coming back because of each other,” said Derek Thomas, who leads Growing Community.

“Fall is my favorite time of the season because everyone gets to see what they’ve grown together, and we start dreaming about the next one. A garden teaches you patience and care, and it reminds you that you’re part of something bigger.”

This season’s programming has explored how gardens serve as both formal and informal classrooms. They are places where neighbors discover and nurture a connection to the land and a sense of stewardship for it, which is central to how the museum understands “community” in its broadest sense: the people and the spaces they share.

Gardens are more than seeds and soil. They are civic spaces where people grow alongside the plants, where families find security and stability, and where neighbors build the bonds that help a community imagine its future.

The fall workshops carry that idea through to the end of the season. Whether you have been tending a bed with us for years or have never planted a seed, we hope you will roll up your sleeves and join us. We look forward to continuing to grow with you.



Join us at the museum for the harvest season programming:

Endings and Beginnings in the Fall Garden

Saturday, Oct. 24, 10 a.m. to noon

Mark the turn of the season by celebrating the close of summer growing and the start of the fall and winter garden. Participants will enjoy the season’s summer crops and learn how to plant and tend vegetables that thrive in late fall and winter. Because fall has always been a time for gardeners to reflect and plan, the morning also includes storytelling and journaling, with time to revisit garden journals and share stories from the summer. All ages are welcome.

Gardens as Places of Art

Saturday, Nov. 7, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
What happens when you look at a garden as a living sculpture? This workshop explores where plants, art and nature meet. Participants will forage the garden for found objects that catch their eye, then use them to create a canvas collage that reflects the living environment around us.

Fall Harvest

Saturday, Nov. 21, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. 
The season finale brings everyone together in the ACM Community Garden for hands-on gardening and harvesting, a wellness moment featuring a Good Intentions Card Exchange, and shadow box making. It is a chance to connect, reflect and celebrate everything the season has produced. Youth gardeners and families are especially encouraged to attend, and no gardening experience is needed.

All workshops are free and take place at the Smithsonian’s Anacostia Community Museum, 1901 Fort Place SE. You can find links to register and learn more about each workshop on the museum’s events calendar.

Amy Kehs | Read More

Amy Kehs is a brand strategist and communications expert for museums.