July 4th Special: Great Expectations, CP LIVE with Ben Futa of Botany & CO, South Bend, IN

Cultivating Place: Conversations on Natural History and the Human Impulse to Garden

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 dedicated to “empowering more people to plant more plants in more places!” In a town that has seen more than its share of social, economic, and environmental challenges in the past few decades, Botany & Co., Ben’s dream come true, is stimulating community, biodiversity, economic growth, and joy. It was bitterly cold in South Bend last March, but Botany Shop was warm with sharing, with growing, and with community – all of which you can hear in this conversation. The full cohort of the ten 2024/2025 transformative CP LIVE experiences is right now being crafted by the CP LIVE team into a powerful documentary film experience, sharing the many–often surprising and unseen–ways that (big G) Gardeners cultivating their places with care grow us ALL better. And when we see the full power of Gardeners, we value them more appropriately. When we value and support them, they can grow our world better, even more beautifully, more intentionally, and more effectively. This July 4th week here in the U.S., as we think about the privileges, opportunities and responsibilities of being citizens of our places, we’re so pleased to share forward this conversation with Ben, a remarkable plantsperson, ecosystem and community steward, and regular host here on Cultivating Place. For much more about the CP LIVE documentary film in-process: ➡️ cultivatingplace.org/film to see, share, and support for yourself 💚. Cultivating Place now has a donate button! We thank you so much for listening over the years, and we hope you'll 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. All photos are courtesy of Ben Futa, Botany & Co., Myriam Nicodemus, and Jennifer Jewell. All rights are reserved.