About Gayla
Gayla Trail’s zeal for growing knows no boundaries… – Better Homes and Gardens
Gayla Trail is a writer, photographer, and graphic designer with a background in the Fine Arts, cultural criticism, and ecology.
Gayla’s love for gardening began with parsley seeds planted in a Styrofoam cup when she was five years old. Inspired by the potato plants her grandmother grew in a bucket on her senior center’s fire escape, Gayla has always gardened in whatever space she had available. She is the creator of the popular gardening project, You Grow Girl (now in its 10th year), a community for laid-back but enthusiastic gardeners, where she also shares her love of plants and personal experiences tending three very urban gardens: a rooftop edible container garden, a community garden plot, and a guerrilla garden planted in a once derelict space on the side of her building.
She is the author of two books on gardening: You Grow Girl: The Groundbreaking Guide to Gardening (Simon and Schuster, 2005) and Grow Great Grub: Organic Food from Small Spaces (Clarkson Potter/Random House, 2010).
Gayla writes a kitchen gardening column for The Globe & Mail, contributes regularly to magazines, and is a frequent speaker and spokesperson on the topics of urban gardening, ecology, and community.
Gayla’s work as a photographer is informed by both her passion for gardening and the natural world and her childhood experiences growing up in Southern Ontario. At its heart, her work is expressive and evocative of emotions tied to locations and the nuances of human presence. Her personal site, MakingHappy.com was named Best Canadian Photoblog, and her work has been exhibited in several North American galleries, magazines, and books.