Episode 785: “Cultivating Place’s” Jennifer Jewell on the Power of Gardeners
September 9th, 2026
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Jennifer Jewell’s long-running public radio show “Cultivating Place“ asks: “Is cultivating place well the ability to feed your family better? Is it the ability to have a say in how our climate and our environment is cared for, starting right in our own backyards? Is it, in part, the tending to your household or community economy in a healthy and sane manner? Is it carrying the culture of your ancestors forward into the future or perhaps even rewriting the culture as you found it into the one you would like to tend and grow?”
She continues, “Cultivating your place might even just be a matter of putting beautiful flowers on your bedside table every week you can, or having the gift of a public park or greenspace near enough that you can walk there, sit in the sun, or greet the trees and other neighbors there…”
Jennifer is a Slow Flowers member who has joined us in advocating and supporting for domestic floral agriculture, local and seasonal flower growing and sourcing, and sustainable floral design practices that honor the land, the people connected to that land, and their communities. Today, she joins me to share news of the first, live, Cultivating Place symposium, taking place in South Bend, Indiana, later this month. It is called “The Power of Gardeners,” which is also the title of the new, 10-part Cultivating Place documentary series set to debut on PBS nationwide next spring. I’m delighted to catch up with Jennifer and you’re invited to listen in!
I’m thrilled to welcome Jennifer Jewell as a return guest to the Slow Flowers Podcast, as she updates us about all that’s happening in the Cultivating Place community.
Jennifer is the founder and host of Cultivating Place, a national award-winning weekly public radio program and podcast that debuted in 2016. The show evolved from Jennifer’s first public radio program, “In A North State Garden,” which aired on North State Public Radio in Northern California from 2008 to 2015. Her current one-hour, interview-based program, “Cultivating Place: Conversations on Natural History and the Human Impulse to Garden,” is co-produced by North State Public Radio and focuses on the culture of gardening around the world. Cultivating Place is syndicated on NPR affiliate radio stations across California and in Ohio and available as individual episodes to public radio stations on Public Radio Exchange (PRX).
The Power of Gardeners speaker lineup:
Bottom row: Chris Fehlhaber (left) and Wambui Ippolito (right)
Over the years, a passionate community has formed around Cultivating Place, and later this month, hosts, listeners, and friends, will gather for their first in-person symposium, called “The Power of Gardeners” The Symposium includes a full day of lectures and panels on Friday, September 25. In addition to the show’s co-hosts Abra Lee and Ben Futa, Jennifer will be joined by Wambui Ippolito and Chris Fehlhaber to round out the speaker lineup. The gathering will also include a panel on the creation of The Power of Gardeners documentary series, with filmmaker and director Myriam Nicodemus.
The Power of Gardeners will continue on Saturday, September 26th, with a guided tour led by Ben Futa, as participants will visit his South Bend floriculture and horticulture enterprises, including the gardening boutique called Botany & Co. and the Lot Next Door Nursery. Later, guests will visit and hear more about the background and future of gardens and green spaces contributing to the reconnection of people, plants, pollinators, and purpose of place in South Bend. Ben is a new member of Slow Flowers, as he is now a cut flower farmer who grows on satellite land near Botany & Co. We’ll learn more from him in a future episode of the Slow Flowers Podcast, I promise.
Let’s jump right in and welcome Jennifer Jewell to the Slow Flowers Podcast. Together we will explore what she means by the phrase “cultivating place,” and how we all should embody the word “Gardener, with a capital G.” A program note: The first 3 minutes of today’s episode includes a trailer for “The Power of Gardeners;” it’s a sneak peek into the new PBS documentary series set to debut next April. This will be followed by my extended interview with Jennifer.
There is still time to register at the Early Bird rate of $140 to attend The Power of Gardeners – the discount continues through September 15th. Follow the link in our show notes for more details. As I mentioned to Jennifer, this is an incredibly affordable event, so if you’re in the region and you can make the trip to South Bend, I encourage you to do so.
In South Bend, you‘ll learn lessons from people tending plants in their places, despite many odds, and in doing so growing everything better: the ecology of interdependent gardens, the look and feel of the city, the economic and cultural integrity and vibrancy of their communities, and the future history of these people and this place.
Thank you to our Sponsors
This show is brought to you by slowflowers.com, the free, online directory to florists, shops, and studios who design with local, seasonal and sustainable flowers and to the farms that grow those blooms. It’s the conscious choice for buying and sending flowers.
And thank you to our lead sponsor, My Patio Tree: Expertly Grown Plants, Perfectly Designed to Elevate Your Garden. Their second-generation family tree farm has curated the best-performing, cutting-edge, multi-zone varieties to enhance your garden, patio or special event. Every tree purchased supports Plant With Purpose, a nonprofit organization that restores hope by reversing global poverty and environmental damage. Learn more at mypatiotree.com.
Thank you to Charles Little & Company for supplying our industry with some of the most beautiful and sustainably-grown design ingredients, available nationwide through their website at charleslittleandcompany.com. Based in Eugene, Oregon, the farmers at Charles Little & Company have been growing and drying flowers since 1986. New products and dried flower collections are added to their website at the first of each month. Check it out at charleslittleandcompany.com.
And thank you to the Seattle Growers Market, a farmer-owned cooperative committed to providing the very best the Pacific Northwest has to offer in cut flowers, foliage and plants. The Growers Market’s mission is to foster a vibrant marketplace that sustains local flower farms and provides top-quality products and service to the local floral industry. Visit them at seattlegrowersmarket.com.
The Slow Flowers Podcast is a member-supported endeavor, downloaded more than 1.6 million times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much. As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of our domestic cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too. If you’re new to our weekly Show and our long-running Podcast, check out all of our resources at SlowFlowersSociety.com.
I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Show & Podcast. The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow Flowers on the table, one stem, one vase at a time. Thanks so much for joining us today and I’ll see you next week!
Music credits:
Drone Pine; Gaena; Heartland Flyer
by Blue Dot Sessions
http://www.sessions.blue
Lovely
by Tryad
http://tryad.bandcamp.com/album/instrumentals
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
In The Field
audionautix.com