CURRENT POSITION Adult Services Librarian, Middle Country Public Library, NY DEGREE MLIS, Queens College, CUNY, 2012 FAST FACT Gagliardi can be found hula-hooping on the beaches of Long Island, at music festivals, or in her backyard while enjoying her garden and flowers. FOLLOW longislandseedlibraries.org; mcplibrary.org/adults/seed-library; linkedin.com/in/amber-gagliardi Photo by Kevin Henegan

Sowing Seeds

Amber Gagliardi’s passion for gardening started as a child when she helped her grandfather plant seeds. She dreamed of starting a seed library at Middle Country Public Library (MCPL) for years before launching one in 2018 with 15 varieties of vegetable, herb, and flower seeds.

In spring 2020, during the beginning of the COVID–19 pandemic, Gagliardi packaged and mailed 440 seed packets to 110 patrons from her home. She recalls, “I saw the Seed Library as a way of giving our community the correct tools to grow their own healthy, organic food and plant native flowers that could benefit the environment.”

In 2023, MCPL’s gardening offerings expanded to include 26 adult programs incorporating nutrition and cooking. More than 400 patrons attended the programs, made possible by partnerships Gagliardi helped to forge with Hobbs Farm, Centereach’s local community-based farm, and nutritionists at Cornell Cooperative Extension (CCE) of Suffolk County. The partnership with CCE also produced Local Eats, a popular program series serving 1,000 patrons since its inception in 2020. CCE extended this series to libraries throughout Suffolk County.

Gagliardi cofounded the Long Island Seed Libraries Roundtable in 2019 with Regina Dlugokencky, founder of the first seed library in Nassau County, NY. This year, more than 50 percent of Long Island public libraries will have seed libraries.

Gagliardi plans to strengthen connections between Long Island environmental organizations and librarians to continue public education, create gardens, and work to restore pollinators. “I am passionate about creating well-planned-out and memorable events and programs for the community and fellow librarians,” she says.