Immersion Description
The intention for this Intro to Herbalism in person immersion is to grow each individual’s awareness and relationship to their own internal ecology, the territory they are on and the messages that the plants growing in the North East bioregion are sharing with us. These four sessions aim to activate observational skills and curiosity towards learning about the beings growing and living around and with us—whether we live in an urban landscape or not. We will also be learning basic medicine making skills to support you and your loved ones.
Join Herban Cura founder Antonia Estela Pérez in a Summer NYC herbal immersion. If you are interested in beginning your journey with plants or looking to orient to the land within New York City, this 4 week journey will support you in feeling attuned to your inner and outer landscape.
We will be spending our time identifying plants, building relationship with them, learning to make herbal remedies, and practicing how to integrate these teachings into our daily lives.
Participants will have an opportunity to support with Herban Cura’s Plants to the People during the period of our immersion for deeper learning and hands-on experience.
During our time together students will have four months FREE access to our Living Library which has access to over 100 hours of knowledge shares. These knowledge shares will serve as supplementary and additional education. The 2024 herbal immersion cohort will have their own channel in the Living Library, where we can communicate between sessions, share resources, questions, practices, recipes and strengthen connections with each other. Participants will have access to the complete Living Library platform.
Immersion Includes
4 week series: Sundays July 21, August 4, August 11, August 25
1-4:30pm EST
Sessions will be 3.5 hours, with a 30 minute break in the middle. Sessions will include, lecture, hands on, whole group and small group time.
Week 1 July 21
Plant ID - Building relationships to plants
Ecological frameworks
Interrogating plant rhetoric
Teas, infusions, decoctions
Week 2 August 4
Plant ID - Building relationships to plants
Reciprocal plant relationships
Seasonal and plant energetics
Food as Medicine
Week 3 August 11 - Possible Hudson Valley location
Plant ID - Building relationships to plants
Herbal Mutual Aid
Dream and smoke medicine
Glycerites and Oxymels
Tinctures and Elixirs
Week 4 August 25
Plant ID - Building relationships to plants
Limpias and energetic hygiene
Oils and herbal balms
Lymph Massage
Aside from topics covered in class, students will engage in reading and hands on assignments that will support their ability to integrate the material into their personal healing practices.
Topics are subject to change depending on student interests, what is growing and timing
More topics covered
Awarness practices
Plant identification
Body Systems
Ferments
Body butters
Flower essences
Herbal Balms
Fortifying plant relationships
Plants to the People Dates (Herbal Immersion students will have the opportunity to join Herban Cura for 1 or all of the below Plants to the People dates in Washington Heights).
Saturday August 24 1-4pm
Saturday September 28th 1-4pm
Saturday October TBD 1-4pm
Access to the Living Library
During our time together students will have 4 months FREE access to our Living Library which has access to over 100 hours of knowledge shares. These knowledge shares will serve as supplementary and additional education. The 2024 herbal immersion cohort will have the opportunity to communicate between sessions, share resources, questions, practices, recipes and strengthen connections between participants.
Participants will have access to the complete Living Library platform.
Exchange
Sliding Scale: $555 -$1111 (for all four sessions). Tuition covers material costs
When choosing the tier on the sliding scale please be honest with what you can afford. If you can pay at the higher end, please do so as that gives space for folks who can’t.
For more information on sliding scale please check out this amazing work!
REGISTRATION CLOSES June 1
Spaces are limited to 20 people
In Person Gathering
1-4:30pm EST
Our immersion will take place primarily in Washington Heights, NYC, with a possible trip upstate. Our time together will be a combination of outdoor and indoor time. 1.5 hours plant id and connection and 1.5 hours of medicine making
Facilitator
Antonia is a Chilean-American clinical herbalist, gardener, educator, community organizer, and founder. Born and raised in New York City, in a first-generation household which nurtured the values and principles of nature appreciation, land stewardship, interdisciplinary education, and social justice—Antonia’s lifelong passion for herbs and plant medicine helps to bridge the relationships between rural and urban spaces. Antonia combines a decade of experience studying and working with plant medicine, with her studies in environmental and urban studies at Bard College, Clinical Herbalism at Arborvitae School of Traditional Herbal Medicine, and learning with herbalists and elders throughout Central and South America. Antonia facilitates workshops and produces events as the co-founder of NY-based collective—Brujas—and as founder of Herban Cura: An herbal medicine and education project which centers the knowledge and stories of Indigenous, Black, Queer and Trans communities. Antonia’s work is rooted in her passion for sharing knowledge that interrupts notions of individualism and separatism from nature to grow towards collaborative and symbiotic communities.