Spring is of course perfect for some wild dreams about what we can and will sow in the seasons to come. With plants, and with ourselves. Jen William’s vision for her work as Wild Dreams Farm and Seed on Washington’s Vashon Island is to ensure abundance and biodiversity in our culture and in our gardens by growing and breeding open pollinated vegetable, flower, and herb seeds which nourish our human and more than human communities. I had the great joy of visiting Wild Dreams

Spring is stirring, buds are swelling, and soil is warming. This week we celebrate the joys of healthy, living soil in conversation with Omar Al Shafie, co-founder of Northern California-based Teregen Ag , a purpose-driven, innovative, soil and plant nutrient producer and researcher dedicated to furthering our collective transition toward sustainable, regenerative farming. Having witnessed firsthand how healthy soil can transform not just crops, but entire ecosystems and comm

This week on  Cultivating Place , host Ben Futa is in conversation with John Little, an ecological designer and public horticulture advocate living and working in the UK. His firm, the Grass Roof Company , launched in 1998. Ever since, they have been expanding and broadening ideas around public plantings, habitat, and those who care for them. John's not-for-profit,  Care, Not Capital , is training the next generation of public gardeners with the skills they need to fully serv

This week on Cultivating Place , Abra Lee is in conversation with Laverne Brockington and Vance Davis, great nieces of Annie Mae Vann Reid, a historic florist and entrepreneur based in Darlington, South Carolina. From the 1920s to the 1960s, Annie Mae tended a thriving floral business that grew out of her hobby flower garden, and grew her community with her. For Laverne and Vance, their aunt's legacy is rooted not only in flowers but in faith and a deep commitment to communit

As the earliest signs of spring unfurl in the mild climates–think snowdrops manzanita, the earliest narcissus, wild iris and Daphne odora , hmmm!–the earliest pollinators are paying even more attention than we are. This week we learn more about some of our earliest and BEST native pollinating bees – the orchard mason bees. We’re in conversation with Thyra McKelvie, who loves “these sweet little bees". And it was this love that brought her to gardening in her adulthood. Based

In these dark, cold days of February, when too much rain or snow, and WAY TOO MUCH ICE, or not enough rain or snow, might be getting you down, we take this week, just in time for Valentine’s Day, to embrace, lean into, and love the comforts of tea. We're in conversation with Michael Fritts, founder of Golden Feather Tea in Concow, CA, to explore the history, cultivation, the rituals and the rewards (which are many) of tea. After more than 15 years at it, and despite massive

For our final episode of January, we honor gardening and Cultivating Place  often in spite of the odds. It ’s been a full year since the devastating fires of Los Angeles, California in January of 2025. Many lives were lost, many acres and homes were burned. And many gardens, cultivated spaces, and gardeners were profoundly impacted. This week, we check - in with two humans who are cultivating their place with care in the wake of this catastrophe. Leigh Adams and Shawn Maestr

January is prime seed-dreaming and seed-catalogue season. With that in mind we’re revisiting a favorite conversation all about generosity, mutual care, good seeds, and seed people. Who doesn’t need more of all those as we continue to lay the foundation for this new year? Ken Greene – who goes by K - is a seed person. He is the co-founder of the Hudson Valley Seed Library , which in 2004 became the first public library based seed lending library in the US; in 2008 he went on t

In honor of the new year fresh-faced and open-hearted in front of us, Ben Futa, Abra Lee and I together this week for a first-ever check in as we review 2025 and look forward to all that we will grow together in 2026.\   Including now being on the airwaves on the Western Slope of Colorado on KVNF Community Radio for their winter months! So glad to meet all you Western Slope Gardeners!   Happy Holidays! Follow Us Online: cultivatingplace.org and on Instagram: @cultivating_Plac

Dr. Jared Barnes is a big G gardener – and has been since his earliest expressions of self as a toddler. Now a professor of horticulture at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas, Jared is also a writer under the name of Meristem , and the host of The Plantastic podcast . where he exclaims that: "Plants can’t talk, but we can! The Plantastic Podcast is a show for plant killers, green thumbs, and everyone in between." He wants everyone’s expression of self t

This week on CP we kick off ARTOBER. Host Ben Futa is talking all things Wild By Design, the Art of Planting, in conversation with Ben...

This week on Cultivating Place , in honor of this first week of Autumn, and the idea of passing time, looking back, and the importance of...

This week on Cultivating Place , we lean into The Art of CP, exploring how the act of Cultivating Place is artful, and how the creative...

This week on Cultivating Place , we celebrate late summer and fall on the horizon in conversation about one of fall’s stars in the...

As autumn and harvest begins to color the edges of our awareness, this week on Cultivating Place we’re joined by two people whose work...

Looking back, even just this year, Cultivating Place has had multiple conversations with plantspeople from around the country about the...

Hot August nights turn to bright August nights at the Olbrich Botanical Gardens in Madison, WI. The Garden's annual GLEAM light show is...

Cultivating Plac e and Cultivating Place Live  are made possible in part through the generosity of the Catto Shaw Foundation. Are you...

This week on Cultivating Place you are in for a real summer adventure on a global garden armchair tour of sorts with a plantswoman who...

THIS WEEK on CP - OUR NEXT CP LIVE podcast! And we head to Indiana with our very own Ben Futa! Botany & Co. in South Bend, Indiana is...