Speaker Series: Our Year at Killara Farm with Christine Allen and Michael Kluckner

From 1993 to 2006, Christine Allen and Michael Kluckner lived on a 9-acre farm in the Fraser Valley. During this time, Christine kept a series of journals documenting the development of her 1-acre garden, as well as observations on the lives of the domestic and wild animals that shared their land. These journals, enhanced by Michael’s evocative paintings, became the basis for A Year at Killara Farm, which will be available for sale at the talk.

Christine Allen is a long-time volunteer at VanDusen Botanical Garden, and has received both an Award of Recognition and an Award of Distinction from her fellow volunteers. She teaches in the Vancouver Master Gardener program, and is regularly invited to speak to garden clubs and other organizations. She has also written many articles for gardening publications in Canada and the U.S.

Christine is the author of several books, including Gardens of Vancouver and Roses for the Pacific Northwest. Her most recent book is A Year at Killara Farm (Harbour Publishing), a memoir of her garden on the Langley farm where she lived from 1992 to 2006.

Michael Kluckner is an artist and the author of a number of illustrated books, several focusing on Vancouver. During his and Christine’s time on the farm, he wrote two books – The Pullet Surprise (1997) and Wise Acres (2000) – as well as magazine articles for publications such as Harrowsmith. He is president of Vancouver Historical Society and chairs the city’s Heritage Commission. His recent creative interests include graphic novels on the Japanese-Canadian wartime internment (“Toshiko”) and the writer-explorer Julia Henshaw.
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