Linda Bell was born into a family of soybean and cotton farmers in the Mississippi Delta. After attending Mississippi State where she studied horticulture science, she married and began following her husband’s career moves. She has owned a party design business in Mississippi, worked for Trapps Florist in Kansas City, and managed a community garden in Tampa, Fla. It was in Vero Beach where she merged her background in horticulture science with design. She and her family moved to Chapel Hill in 2003, where she began working at Southern States in Carrboro, honing the plant knowledge.  Today she owns a small garden design business in the area, and volunteers as a Master Gardener with the Master Gardeners of Orange County.