Empowered Spaces Community Garden
Planting Connections, Growing Communities
Imagine a space where fresh food is grown by the community, for the community.
Where your hands in the soil heal both the land and yourself.
A garden where people come together to learn, heal, and build a more just and sustainable future.
That’s what we’re growing at Empowered Spaces Community Garden—
and we invite you to be a part of it!
What is the Empowered Spaces Community Garden?
Located at the heart of our holistic healing center, our community-led garden is rooted in permaculture principles, perennial agriculture, environmental sustainability, and community care.
Our garden is currently made up of 35 fruit and nut trees, 6 raised garden beds, a pollination garden, a medicinal herb bed, and a tea garden.
We believe that food is medicine, that land stewardship is healing, and that everyone—regardless of income—deserves access to nutritious, high-quality food.
Through our Collaborative Food Share Program we share the harvest with individuals and families in the community who are in need of access to quality food.
More Than Just a Garden—
We Are a Movement
At Empowered Spaces Community Garden, we aren’t just tending the soil—we’re tending to community, justice, and collective healing.
We grow food and share it.
The vast majority of our harvest is shared with individuals and families in need because we believe fresh, organic food should be a right, not a privilege.
We teach and empower.
Our garden is a living classroom, helping people develop skills in sustainable gardening, permaculture practices, and ecological healing.
We honor the land.
We use regenerative, environmentally conscious practices to care for the earth while it cares for us.
We’re reclaiming relationships—with land and each other.
Our co-op fosters community care, mutual support, and interdependence - offering a space where everyone feels seen, valued, and connected.
We’re integrating healing into our work.
Gardening is not just about growing food—it’s about growing resilience. As part of a holistic healing center, we recognize that working with the land is also a form of trauma healing, self-reclamation, and collective care.
When you become a member of the Empowered Spaces Community Garden, you’re not just signing up to garden—
you’re showing up in community.
Why Join the Garden Co-op?
LEARN & PRACTICE –
Whether you’re a seasoned gardener or a total beginner, you’ll gain hands-on experience in organic gardening, permaculture, and sustainable land stewardship.
COMMUNITY CARE –
Be part of a cooperative where mutual support, equity, and justice guide everything we do. Participate in community organizing and activism through locally-based partnerships and programs. It’s about community, not just crops.
HEAL, LEARN & GROW –
Experience the therapeutic benefits of gardening, while also attending our holistic healing workshop series “In The Garden”, which will explore integrative justice driven approaches to embodiment, mental health, and wellness, both individually and collectively. Offerings will include yoga, meditation, sound healing, creative expression and more
CONNECT & GIVE BACK –
Through the Collaborative Food Share Program, be a part of community care and help provide nutritious, organic food to those who need it most while fostering resilience and sustainability. The vast majority of the produce will be shared with those in need, and every garden member will also take home a small basket of produce on garden workdays during harvest seasons.
We currently meet for garden workdays one Saturday 9:00 - 11:00am a month, and one Sunday 10:00 - 12:00pm a month.
Prior to each garden workday you are invited to join us for Yoga In The Garden - a 30-minute yoga class in the garden. See below for more details.
Kids are welcomed, and encouraged, to join us!
Schedule:
Sunday, April 13
Saturday, April 26
Sunday, May 4
Saturday, May 17
Sunday, June 1
Saturday, June 21
Sunday, July 13
Saturday, July 26
Sunday, August 3
Saturday, August 16
Sunday, September 7
Saturday, September 20
Sunday, October 5
Saturday, October 18
To join the garden co-op, all members will:
Sign up with a self-determined sliding-scale annual membership fee. See below for how to sign up.
Sign up to attend the garden workdays that work in your schedule.
All garden members will receive a small basket of fresh produce on harvest days during growing seasons.
Those in a position to give more hours and/or funds are also welcome to sponsor additional baskets that go directly to families in need of fresh produce.
Sign up Here
Sign up with a self-determined sliding-scale annual membership fee, or make a one-time donation to the garden.
Given that we are living within multiple intersecting systems of oppression, a sliding scale acknowledges that our access to financial capital and resources varies as a result. Based on the ways that your identity grants you access to privilege and social capital, (e.g. race, gender & sexual identity, socio-economic status, educational background, able-bodied-ness, etc.), select an annual membership fee on the scale of $5-$75.
Send in your membership fee or a donation via:
***Please note in the drop down box whether you are signing up as a garden member or making a one-time donation***
Venmo - to Kelly Caul (@EmpoweredSpaces).
Check made out to Empowered Spaces, LLC and mailed to:
7602 Big Bend Blvd, St. Louis, MO 63119.
Paypal (please note that 3% of your donation will
be deducted for service fee)
Yoga In The Garden
Join us for Yoga In The Garden - a free 30-minute yoga class outside in the garden prior to a selection of our garden workdays.
Jessie Kissinger (she/her) and Angela Dahm (she/her) will take turns leading our yoga class on some Saturdays.
We'll focus on forms to prepare your body for gardening. Expect gentle movements to warm up your joints and muscles and a mindfulness practice to invite connection with the natural world. Please bring a mat or blanket that you're comfortable setting up on the grass or feel free to practice directly on the lawn!
Yoga In The Garden on Saturdays:
4/26, 5/17, 6/21, 7/26, 8/16, 9/20, 10/18
In The Garden Workshop Seriess
2024
In The Garden are a series of workshops in the Empowered Spaces Community Garden that explore integrative justice driven approaches to embodiment, mental health, and wellness, both individually and collectively.
These workshops are free to our community garden members, and donation based to the larger community - pay what you can, if you can. 100% of all donations go to supporting the garden and our collaborative food share program with Jamaa Birth Village. Donations can be made at the workshop, or via Venmo or Paypal.
Schedule
June 15
Resonance In The Garden
Join us for Resonance In The Garden onJune 15, 9:00-11:00am with Deanna Danger (they/them). From 9:00 - 10:00 am join us for gardening in the Empowered Spaces Community Garden, and then Soak in a crystal singing bowl sound bath with Deanna Sophia Danger. Allow yourself to wander from the garden, into tune with both Deanna and the cicadas, Resonance In The Garden invites participants to relax body, mind & spirit and integrate natural reciprocity with the abundant harmonies of Mother Earth.
September 7
Painting Connection
From 9:00 - 10:00 am join us for gardening in the Empowered Spaces Community Garden, and then come and cultivate connection through community artmaking. Our time is art therapist designed and will be led by heARTful wellness founder, Renée Tate (she/they). We will be painting pavers that will live in our community garden focused on connection, empowerment, and hope for our community. Come invest in yourself and our community while engaging in creativity and present moment awareness, aspects of being well at a heART level. Genuine wellness is a practice. Let's practice together!
July 28
Botanical Meditations: building relationship with plant allies through somatic experience
Empowered Spaces community members Rachel Tate (they/her) and Brea Youngblood (she/her) (join Brea on 9/22) will provide their own version of this class with opportunity to engage with aromatics in thoughtful ways. In each 30 minute class, you will have the opportunity take in sensation with one or all plants including mint, garden sage, rosemary, or basil. This gathering invites the group to slow down and notice what is present in relationship with plant allies when we take the time to witness and feel. In this gathering you might notice feeling, emotion, or behaviors arise when mindful attention is taken to the mundane world around us. You may very well just notice how good these herbs smell! Either way, we’d love to have you and your curiosity this summer, in the garden.
Empowered Spaces community members Rachel Tate (they/her) (join Rachel on 7/28) and Brea Youngblood (she/her) will provide their own version of this class with opportunity to engage with aromatics in thoughtful ways. In each 30 minute class, you will have the opportunity take in sensation with one or all plants including mint, garden sage, rosemary, or basil. This gathering invites the group to slow down and notice what is present in relationship with plant allies when we take the time to witness and feel. In this gathering you might notice feeling, emotion, or behaviors arise when mindful attention is taken to the mundane world around us. You may very well just notice how good these herbs smell! Either way, we’d love to have you and your curiosity this summer, in the garden.
September 22
Botanical Meditations: building relationship with plant allies through somatic experience
Join us in creating more of the world we want to see!
Mission
The Empowered Spaces Community Garden is an organic gardening cooperative dedicated to quality food access for all, embodied healing and wellness education, equitable and empowering community, and anti-racist solidarities. Through cooperative farming and community partnerships, we seek to create locally-based, environmentally sustainable, trauma-informed and justice-driven modes of connection, resiliency, and interdependence.
Collaborative Food Share Program
Our mission is to provide accessible organic produce and herbs to the wider community that comes together through this partnership.
Deep Gratitude
Thank you to our Community Partner
We are deeply grateful to Denise DeGhelder and our community partner Garden Heights Nursery for donation seedlings and plant starters to our garden.
Thank you to Our Garden Bed Sponsors
Holly Strelow Counseling
Sponsor of a Red Cedar Raised Bed plus Supplies
Doulas of Greater St. Louis
Sponsor of a Red Cedar Raised Bed plus Supplies
Stephanie Dunn and Amy Strothcamp
Sponsor of a Raised Cedar Bed
Becky Mulvihill McKenna, Ph.D., LMFT, LCSW
Sponsor of a Raised Cedar Bed
Sponsor of a Raised Cedar Bed by an Anonymous Donor
Thank You to Our Orchard Sponsors
Neil & Mary Kiesel
Sponsor of 1 Almond Tree
Cindy Heidenry, MSW, LCSW
Sponsor of 1 Almond Tree
Carol Devanny
Sponsor of 2 Paw Paw Trees
Kelly Storck
Sponsor of 1 Raspberry Bush
Dottie and Colton Coriell
Sponsor of 4 Persimmon Trees
Denise, Jen and Jason from Rolling Ridge Nursery
Sponsor of 3 Clove Currants
Anu French
Sponsor of Bush Cherries
Maizie Ellingsen
Sponsor of 2 Apple Trees
Everett Ellingsen
Sponsor of 9 Raspberry Bushes
Jeff & Linda Caul
Sponsor of 2 Asian Pear Trees
Oasis Counseling Services
Sponsor of 1 Almond Tree
Jeni Schilpzand
Sponsor of 2 Clove Currants
This garden is made possible and supported by Kelly Caul, Founding Director of Empowered Spaces, and the Empowered Spaces Team. Thank you also to Gateway Greening, who provided the initial grant and infrastructure for the garden.
Thank you to Amy Knox, Rena Schergen, Rieko Griffin, and Kelly Caul- our Community Garden Leadership Circle!
A huge thank you to Sarika Talve-Goodman! The birth of this garden would not have happened without her. Sarika Talve-Goodman is at the beginning of deeper learning about community gardening and permaculture. This process is supported by the mentorship of Karen Flotte, who leads the Mitzvah Farm at Central Reform Congregation.
