Hans Hansen

Hans Hansen grew up on a dairy farm on the windswept prairie of southwestern Minnesota. He started “helping” in the family vegetable garden at the age of three and was avidly building an ornamental plant collection by the time he was in kindergarten. After studying horticulture in college, he purchased a home on five acres, where he grew and hybridized thousands of plants grouped by genus. Moving to western Michigan meant gardening on a much smaller scale, but the region’s warmer climate and nearly 80 annual inches of insulating lake-effect snow have made it possible for him to grow a whole new palette of plants.