HomeMeet the Team

The Cultivate Team

Joanne Aquilina
President

Joanne is an energetic and enthusiastic industry champion. She has a particular passion for expanding awareness of the benefits of therapeutic, sensory, healing, edible and dementia gardens, especially for individuals with illness, disability and children with special needs.

Read more about Joanne here

Eleanor Dennis
Vice-President/Secretary

Eleanor is constantly marvelling at the diversity, complexity and beauty of mother nature and can often be found wandering with camera in hand taking photos of plants, bark, leaves, seeds, flowers and insects to use as inspiration in her artwork. Eleanor is CEO of Seed Harvest Spoon and witnesses daily the wonder of kids and adults alike as they discover just how connected we are to nature and how important it is to maintain and nurture that connection.

Read more about Eleanor here

Jan Cantrell
Treasurer

Jan is a Horticulturist with a background in Rehabilitation Counselling. She has a Diploma Landscape Design, Cert III Landscape (Construction), B.A. Post Grad Health Science (Rehabilitation Counselling) and believes that too much horticulture is barely enough!

Read more about Jan here

Phil Pettitt
Committee Member

Phil loves being outside helping community and does this every weekday in his role as Community Greening Coordinator with the Royal Botanic Gardens. His weekends are spent in the outdoors in the water or at a remote natural location - surfing, walking and paddling, getting his green or blue therapy!

Read more about Phil here

Jacquie Dredge
Committee Member

Jacquie (Jaq) is Co-Founder and Director of Panania Free Rangers, a not for profit organisation run by volunteers. She has a background in social and community services working in child care, aged and disability care. Jaq has always been a gardener and tried to sneak gardening activities into every role she's had!

Read more about Jaq here

Kath Temple
Committee Member

Kath is a Horticultural TAFE teacher specialising in teaching Landscape Design. She has a special interest in designing gardens in aged care centres, playspaces and sensory gardens in schools and redesigning gardens lost by bushfires. She volunteers in a local aged care facility. She teaches designing therapeutic gardens as part of the design course and loves to encourage her students to follow this area of Landscape design.

Read more about Kath here

Jon Kingston
Committee Member

Jon is a Horticulturalist and Sustainability Educator. Among other things, Jon works in the Wayside Chapel's community rooftop garden, demonstrating community gardening as a way of life. He has also been involved in other gardening projects around Australia.

Read more about Jon here

Katrine Mardini
Committee Member

Katrine is a Senior Landscape Architect specialising in unique, natural and sensory inclusive playspaces for all ages and all settings such as childcare centres, schools, shopping centres, community spaces and parks.

Read more about Katrine here

Sharon Moore-Lambert
Committee Member

Sharon loves swimming, reading and of course gardening. She runs a small business called Cultivating Hope where she works one on one with people who share a passion for gardening and nature but find it challenging to do on their own due to disabilities. Sharon works in the aged care and disability sectors in the Sutherland Shire.

Read more about Sharon here

Erin Poga
Executive Officer

Erin has a background in Occupational Therapy. In another life, Erin would love to be a horticultural therapist - she loves working with people to solve problems and to improve their lives and believes that nature is the best healer out there. As well as taking on the admin role for Cultivate, she is a mum to baby Leo and studying the Alexander Technique part time.