Processing with Cotton @ Amboy Community Garden

A sampling of cotton sown and grown in Brooklyn this past Spring & Summer. Photo by Maya M. S.

This past Saturday we continued our plant journey with cotton during the second installment of CURE: Connecting with Cotton at Amboy Street Community Garden. We started the session off welcoming folks with coffee, fresh local bread, and a nourishing vegetable soup prepared by Maya.

Once folks had arrived, Ashni guided us in getting grounded and learning about the medicinal properties and intentions of flower essences. She then shared the process of working with cotton flowers this past year to make the essence we would engage with that morning. Folks were then led into a meditation and given prompts to reflect on where they’re coming from especially in relation to the cotton plant.

Before transitioning into the crafting component of the day, Maya invited folks to check out the cotton bolls and look at photos of the different stages of cotton. Then shared a little about cotton’s botanical origins and agricultural stories as well as a whirlwind timeline of cotton’s exploitation due to European colonization beginning in the 1600s. We also uplifted the many resistance efforts of African and Indigenous diasporas in resisting the exploitation of people and cotton throughout the Americas and Caribbean.

Ashni and Maya then led the group over to our crafting table to guide folks in making an intentional jar filled with cotton and charms. As mentioned in the earlier post for our June session, prior to the workshop, around the Spring Solstice, the Maya and Ashni had sown sea island brown cotton seeds together at East New York Farms. Maya would later step up the seedlings and bring them up to Mumbet’s for the June event, and also transplant many of them during the opening Soul of Food session in April.

During the jar crafting participants were invited to infuse the jar with positive intentions for themself before closing it with a cork or screw top. We wrapped up the day continuing to answer questions about cotton as folks played with the cotton and craft findings.

Big thanks to Tammy + the Amboy Street Community Garden folks for welcoming us into the space; Ashni from the Mumbet’s Freedom Farm team for grounding us; and the NYRP crew for making this event such a smooth success!

A Lil Throwback to the Cotton Growing Season & June Session (Full June Recap HERE)

Cotton seedlings Ashni and Maya sowed in Brooklyn in March 2025, Maya stepped up/potted up in May, and we would be transplanting into the soil at Mumbet’s Freedom Farm during the session. (Photo by Maya M. S.)

Sweet cotton seedlings sown by Ashni up at Mumbet’s and slowly awakening to the warmth, we would also be lovingly transplanting these babies into the soil alongside their big siblings! Later in the session we would discuss the differences and sensitivities of the cotton plants between our urban and rural growing environments. (Photo by Maya M. S.)

Ashni grounding the group into the space with a cotton essence meditation and journaling/painting prompt. (Photo by Maya M. S.)

Maya offering some context about different cotton species’ botanical origins and journeys as well as mistreatment during the early stages of European colonization, forced removal, and exploitation of people, land and peoples across Black and Indigenous diasporas. (Photo by Grace [possibly]).

Below are photos of the second half of the session when Ashni and Maya went into cultivating cotton and their journeys with growing cotton in different settings as well as with a myriad of different things going on in their life. After a brief transplanting demo and discussion folks began getting the seedlings into the ground.

(Some photos by Grace and Maya with many of the remaining photos taken by various participants, thanks to everyone for capturing snippets of this day!)