“A Place to Gather and Grow”
Trellis is a horticultural therapy program in Decatur, Georgia, designed to help people with disabilities find community, purpose, and healing through gardening, art, and shared creative work. This photo essay follows the people who make Trellis what it is, including founders, participants, and volunteers.
Founded in 2017, Trellis helps people with disabilities experience the restorative benefits of nature by creating accessible gardens and therapeutic programs in the Atlanta area. The organization started with offsite programs, but after several years realized it needed a sustainable home base. Its first program was hosted at Callanwolde Fine Arts Center, and as demand grew, Trellis eventually established its own space at the Ability Garden at Legacy Park in Decatur.
At the head of her Garden Connections class for stroke survivors, Trellis co-founder Rachel Cochran fosters a sense of safety and openness among participants who often face isolation in their recovery.
At the original Callanwolde garden, Gary turns up sweet potatoes while Shurel smiles behind him during a Trellis gardening class for people living with brain injury.
From left, Moe Hemmings of the Atlanta Botanical Garden, participant Marcellus, Wendy Battaglia leading the Gather & Grow class, and Taylor Mead of the Atlanta Botanical Garden.
“We were riding the horses in the woods one day and came upon someone’s pot plant. They were in big pots, and I’m thinking, ‘Holy crap, I didn’t know you could grow pot from seed.’ And so that day started my journey. We tried to grow pot. And that’s how I started gardening.” - Rachel Cochran (Co-Founder of Trellis).
Rachel Conchran, co-founder of Trellis, picks tomatoes in the Ability Garden at Legacy Park. She was inspired in part by her mother’s experience in a rehab facility after breaking her leg at age 85. “It was absolutely terrifying to me because there was nothing, no windows, no green, no access to outdoors. And it just wasn't a healing, nice place. I just thought never, ever put me out, never put me in one of these places. I will go crazy,” she said.
Rachel rustles through basil leaves inside the program’s Legacy Garden. She grew up riding horses in Atlanta, worked 12 years as an environmental specialist with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, and later began a career in grant writing and administration at Georgia Tech.
Rachel helps a participant carve a jack-o’-lantern during a brain injury group at the original Trellis garden at Callanwolde Fine Arts Center, while also overseeing the garden’s upkeep, a task that could easily be a full-time job for most other people.
"I bring a lot of sadness and that's one thing I'm battling when I have a group. I use humor as my way to uplift things because I am pretty funny. But it's hiding a lot.” - Rachel Cochran
At the Grief House, which shares the Nickerson building with Trellis, Rachel Cochran talks about navigating the challenges of her son Jay’s recovery from a brain injury sustained in an accident while also supporting him through his gender transition simultaneously.
Leroy Thompson assembles a small bug hotel during the Gather and Grow group for people with spinal cord injuries. Thompson, who told Rachel he didn’t want to “just stay in [his] house and live,” comes to the program for the chance to participate, connect, and be part of a community.
Brendan Town reviews his notes during a community cocktail-making class held as a fundraiser. Town was paralyzed from the waist down after developing surfer’s myelopathy — a rare, nontraumatic spinal cord injury that occurred during his honeymoon in Hawaii — but has since made remarkable progress in rehabilitation.
“There’s something about looking at your back bar and seeing fresh ingredients from every season, and realizing you can mix it all together and create a work of art. I can make it beautiful, I can make it delicious — I can manipulate it in any which way, shape or form.” -Brendan Town
Brendan Town sets up cocktail ingredients before a cocktail night at the Nickerson House in the new Ability Garden at Legacy Park in Decatur. Town, who has worked across Atlanta dive bars and fine-dining cocktail bars, said, “If you have been living in Atlanta the past 15 years, you might’ve had a cocktail made by me. I’ve found a passion and love through all things beverage.”
Brendan Town leads a cocktail-making class at the head of the table. He volunteers because he enjoys giving back to the programs that helped him.
“There is so much evidence that just being out and working with your hands in the dirt, that it actually reduces pain, the pain level goes away for a little while.” - Rachel Cochran
Jasmine germinates seeds in a jug for the winter during a Gather and Grow class for people with spinal cord injuries, with help from her caretaker. She said coming to the session is far more rewarding than staying at home and watching TV alone.
Volunteer Susan Freeman helps Wayne carve a jack-o’-lantern during a brain injury class at the Trellis greenhouse, still held at Callanwolde Fine Arts Center.
A participant in Rachel Cochran’s Garden Connections class for stroke survivors receives help from a caretaker while assembling a fall wreath from fall flowers and pine cones — a small example of how simply getting people out to the garden, Rachel says, is “99% of it.”
“Plant people are good people. We care about the earth. We care about others.” -Rachel Cochran
Rachel Cochran holds up a wreath made in her Garden Connections class as participant Linda smiles through it. Trellis' programs offer a safe, barrier-free space for people with disabilities to connect with nature, according to Rachel.
Moe Hemmings, left, who works with the Atlanta Botanical Garden and volunteers with Trellis twice a year to lead a six-part Gather and Grow series for people with spinal cord injuries, shows Alex, center, and Loretta, right, how to plant mushroom spores in logs to grow over the winter.
A plate of mushroom risotto is passed among participants during Wendy Battaglia’s Gather & Grow meeting.
Through the frame of a raised planter, participants and volunteers gather for a brain injury group at Trellis. The organization grew from co-founder Rachel Cochran’s early realization that many gardens—and the people who build them—often overlook those with disabilities.
Singles
Guests at the Milton Historical Society’s Shindig fundraiser climb aboard a hayride as cows in a nearby pasture wander over and begin nibbling at the hay piled on the back of the wagon.
At the Marietta Chalktoberfest chalk art and beer festival, large crowds gathered as artists from around the world rushed to put the final touches on their pieces in the last moments of the event.
A man reads his paper in front of a large crowd of protesters at Atlanta City Hall after they marched from Liberty Plaza during the May Day 2025 demonstration.
Women dressed in full Kentucky Derby attire socialize at the Down & Derby fundraiser for Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, while a woman pets Jenny the donkey in the foreground.