Page 12 - BusinessWest February 20, 2023

“I feel like, when people do kind of take that step out of their living room and away from their TVs, they remember just what it’s liketobeinan experience and how you can’t get that anywhere else.”
exploded with happiness because that was what I had been craving for a long time,” he explained.
“I just didn’t feel like I had kind of hit that point or found that right community space that felt comfy for me,” they added. “What’s also really beautiful is having folks who aren’t necessarily part of the queer community come in and see the smiles on their faces because they are experiencing something that’s new to them, something that reminds them, maybe, of someone they love.”
Abbott told BusinessWest that the community was crav- ing more connections after the pandemic, and Arts Night Out allows people to congregate and do the things they loved again.
“We’re coming into a new place here and kind of coming into a new time where we want different things for ourselves as artists,” they said. “We want to thrive more as small-busi- ness owners; we want our communities and the thriving of our businesses to ripple out into our communities.”
Green Growth
Smith Botanical Garden is like the Bloomery — it allows students the feedback and community needed to expand on their artwork.
“It’s a really magical thing to see the interactions with students and the general public,” said Tim Johnson, director of the garden, noting that the institution has been around for 130 years, and its purpose has changed dramatically over time from its initial use as a potting room for the college.
“In a lot of ways, I see the botanical garden and the pro- gramming we get to do as a love letter to the community,” he said. “It’s an opportunity to provide a lens into an institution that — unless you’re a student at the college or you’re a staff member — it’s really hard to see.
“We’re one of the places on the campus that is quite ori- ented toward the public,” he went on, “and we can provide a corridor where our students, our faculty, our scholars, and our researchers get to interact with the public and see how
their work is received, what makes sense and what doesn’t.” The Botanical Garden features rotating exhibits through- out the year that guests can enjoy. The garden is ever-chang-
ing because of the cycles of the plants stored in the green- houses. Currently, it is showcasing “Into the Glass House,” and students have work on display in the Lyman Plant House that was inspired by some of the plants at the gardens.
One anticipated event coming back is the Spring Bulb Show, slated for March 4-19. “It’s like a piece of spring when we’re still in the middle of winter,” said Julie Thompson, Communications coordinator for Smith Botanical Gardens. More than 8,000 bulbs are set to bloom this year. Another highly anticipated event, a 100-year-old Smith tradition, is the Fall Mum Show set for November.
Johnson told BusinessWest that the Botanical Gardens allows humans to reconnect with nature. “It’s pretty easy to forget that — we have cell phones; we have airplanes and space travel,” he said. “But everything that we do is utterly dependent on plants, and our relationship and realization of that really has a lot to do with how we approach our world, our natural resources, and each other.”
Clearly, community is important to the city of Northamp- ton as a whole. It allows locals and tourists to reconnect and enjoy the things they love in spaces that were inaccessible for the past few years.
As COVID evolves into a seasonal sickness, Northampton is planning many events in the coming year, from the Back Porch Festival on March 3-5 to the Northampton Jazz Festi- val in the fall. Overall, there will be many opportunities for people to come into the city and enjoy all it is has to offer.
“I feel like, when people do kind of take that step out of their living room and away from their TVs, they remember just what it’s like to be in an experience and how you can’t get that anywhere else,” Sciarra said. “That’s such a unique experience that can’t be recreated.” BW
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12 FEBRUARY 20, 2023 << COMMUNITY SPOTLIGHT >> BusinessWest