Agricultural Sciences

Student Stories: Horticulture alumna has grown into big job

Although Holly Harmar Shimizu can't remember what she thought she'd be doing 30 years after graduating from Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences, she realized after a recent visit to the University that she is doing what she hoped to all along: working with public horticulture.

Shimizu, a native of Philadelphia, is the executive director of the United States Botanic Garden in Washington, D.C., where she oversees garden development, finances, volunteer and educational outreach and design of new exhibits. Shimizu said her favorite part of the job is being creative and turning ideas into reality for the garden and then seeing how the changes affect visitors.

"It doesn't feel like I am going to work," Shimizu said. "I am the luckiest person."
She said Penn State provided a strong foundation for her future in horticulture and showed her that horticulture is a science and an art.

"Penn State revealed the whole world of horticulture to me," she said.

Recently, Shimizu has been involved in plant conservation in the mid-Atlantic region with the Seeds of Success program and is helping to create voluntary national guidelines and performance benchmarks for sustainable land design, construction and maintenance with the Sustainable Sites Initiative.

"These are very exciting programs to be involved with," said Shimizu. "The aim is to improve the health of the natural environment through careful plant stewardship."

"Although they're essential to our well-being, plants very often get the short end of the stick. As industry grows and global climate change is already a very serious threat, we hope that these programs will establish the necessity of plants to our health and future."

Now a resident of Glen Echo, Md., Shimizu has traveled the world working in botanic gardens in England, Belgium, Germany and Holland and has studied horticulture at many schools. But Penn State was the best, Shimizu asserted.

"Penn State opened doors of opportunity and provided a strong foundation for my future in horticulture," she said.

Holly Shimizu in the Garden Primeval at the U.S. Botanic Garden in Washington, D.C. Credit: Penn StateCreative Commons

Last Updated November 18, 2010

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