Plans for this fall’s Garden of Eden Ball benefiting the Atlanta Botanical Garden are in full bloom.
The event, to be held at 6:30 p.m. Sept. 27 on the garden's Great Lawn, will be themed "Into the Woods," celebrating the garden's expansion in Storza Woods and the opening of the new Atlanta Botanical Garden, Gainesville site, both happening next spring. Its chairs are Roger J. Smith and Christopher M. Jones.
"Our chairs this year are phenomenal; some of the most dedicated people I've ever seen," said Atlanta Botanical Garden President and CEO Mary Pat Matheson. "It will be the same Garden of Eden Ball, but we're refreshing it with some new ideas."
She's excited about the event's host committee, whose members include Mopsy and Doug Aldridge, Melanie Turner and Stan Benecki, Robin Aiken and Bill Bolen, Molly and Matthew Caine, Lane and Richard Courts IV, Suzanne Mott Dansby, Louisa and Michael D'Antignac, Mary Wayne and Bill Dixon, Barbara and Gary Dorminey, Shaun Doty, Joy and John Dyer, Jennifer and Marty Flanagan, Audra Dial and Matthew Ford, Jennifer Fuqua, and Shearon and Taylor Glover.
Also, Katherine and Tom Greene, Ted Griffith, Rand and Seth Hagen, Burch and Mark Hanson, May B. and Hollis Howell III, Mary and John Huntz, Bobbo Jetmundsen, Catharine and Jackson Kelly, Sarah and Jim Kennedy, Caroline and Boyd Leake, Cara Isdell Lee and Zak Lee, Tom E. Lewis, Lauren Fuqua Maronnier and Arnaud Maronnier, Deborah and Bruce Miller, Ashley and Prescott Miller, Ginger Dixon Molloy, Mary Masi and Don Rifenberg, Nancy and Charlie Rigby, Annabelle Dietrich Robinette and Dawn Gordon and Bill Roth.
Finally, Dean and Bronnie Smith, Mary Anne Walser and James Haverty Smith, Thurmond Smithgall, Susan and Jim Spratt, Stephanie and Austin Stephens, Linda and Mason Stephenson, Greer and Alex Taylor and Carol and Ramon Tomé.
Serving as the ball's special adviser will be Dean Dubose Smith. "It underpins the support of the Garden of Eden Ball to have a host committee of that stature," said Matheson, who likes to call the garden "a living museum."
The event’s chairs, Smith and Jones, said assembling the host committee early on was key to the ball’s success.
“One of our missions was to open the garden to a more diverse, eclectic group,” Jones said. “We have people in all different age groups, some of whom weren’t even born at the time of the first Garden of Eden Ball.”
Individual tickets are $475 and patron tickets are $1,500 per couple. For information, see atlantabotanicalgarden.org or email Cindy Chapman at cchapman@atlantabotanicalgarden.org.
The event, presented by Cox Enterprises, which owns The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, honors longtime garden supporter and Atlanta Newspapers Chairman Anne Cox Chambers.
