A New Garden Society, with Erika Rumbley and Renee Portonova

Erika Rumbley and Renee Portanova are Co-Founders and Directors of The New Garden Society. Now, you may hear that phrase and think of a garden club or a plant society. But this organization’s very name invites you to consider a new angle on the words Garden + Society. The New Garden Society is a Boston-based organization run by horticulturists, landscapers, and farmers who seek to expand green industry opportunities for their incarcerated and formerly incarcerated neighbors in greater Boston. They believe in the transformational potential of working with plants, and in connecting incarcerated people with green-industry professions to transform landscapes within and beyond prison walls. Together, they tend to green spaces where both people and plants can flourish. Erika and Renee join Cultivating Place host Jennifer Jewell this week to share more about their intersectional work and why it matters in growing our world better. Listen in! Cultivating Place now has a donate button! We thank you for listening over the years, and we hope you'll continue to support Cultivating Place. We can't thank you enough for making it possible for this young program to grow and engage in even more conversations like these. The show is available as a podcast on SoundCloud and iTunes. To read more and for many more photos, please visit www.cultivatingplace.com.