Growing Flowers of Hope
Gardens are dotting urban landscapes all over the world. Most of these are community gardens where people are growing food. But in Chicago, urban gardeners aren’t growing vegetables, they are growing flowers!
The gardens are part of Southside Blooms, a nonprofit in the Illinois city that employs at-risk youth to grow flowers and to make floral arrangements in the social enterprise according to the organization.
Planting Seeds
Southside Blooms was founded by Quilen Blackwell and Hannah Bonham Blackwell who shared a strong faith and a commitment to helping local kids who were at-risk of joining gangs in the Windy City, reported CNN. In 2015, they formed the nonprofit and began acquiring vacant lots and turning them into flower gardens.
The city gave the Blackwells a free lease for some of the plots and others were donated. The nonprofit purchased additional plots and now there are six flower gardens in the city.
The couple chose to grow flowers instead of fruits and vegetables because they saw the potential that flowers offered. “Eighty percent of flowers come from overseas, so we saw an opportunity to bring that growing production to the inner city,” Blackwell said.
All the flowers are grown sustainably, and the store uses eco-friendly practices by not using foam and only compostable packaging. Even the irrigation systems in the gardens are run on solar power.
Growing to Today
Today, Southside Blooms employs young people aged 16 to 25 on the farms where they learn basic farming skills or in the flower business.
In the early days, youth tended to come and go every few months but now many are staying at Southside Blooms much longer, reported WTTW News. These young people are being promoted and given more responsibilities as team leaders.
“We’re unlocking something in the youth they didn’t know existed,” Blackwell told WTTW. “Flowers can be a vehicle to help their dreams come true. It’s a bottom-up economic solution.”
The social enterprise ships to the 48 contiguous US states and they have a monthly floral service that sends blooms all year long.
Success Stories
Dionta White, 29, works on a flower farm that is near the place where he was shot for the first time, according to CNN. The former gang banger was shot two more times before he realized that he needed to do something else with his life.
Southside Blooms gave him a job and a chance for a fresh start. Now he is a farmer in the flower gardens. It’s a very calm environment. Good people, good environment,” he told CNN. “Being out in nature gets you closer to the earth. It puts you in a good mindset.”
Another employee, Rashod Little grew up wanting to be a basketball player as many urban youths do. But when he needed gainful employment, he started working at Southside Blooms. Now Little’s floral arrangements have been used at events, five-star hotels, and weddings.
”He’s one of our top youth florists,” Blackwell said. “He recently bought a car, bought his own apartment. He’s definitely one of our success stories.”
The Blackwells hope that their work will help change the city for the better, according to WTTW, and that their work will help reverse decades of poverty, unemployment, and hopelessness with flowers. There is still a lot of work to do but the couple believe it will happen, one bouquet at a time.
