Education is at the heart of what we do!
Our education mission at Foliage Botanics is to excite engagement and connection with each other and with the natural world and converge in conversation together at the intersection of people and plants. Our classes aim to empower everyone in their understanding of botany, health, wild foods, ecology, and herbal medicine, all while building community around this shared interest and love. In our classes, we prioritize bioregionalism and ancestral remediation, believe herbal and plant knowledge is everyone’s birthright, and underscore time and again that plant work is both powerful and political!
Who We Are
Foliage Botanics is an earth & wellness-based herbal business run by herbalist & ecologist Hannah Smith Schiller. Our work is focused on botanical education, 1:1 herbal health consultations, small-batch seasonal medicine, and land stewardship. At the core of our philosophy is a commitment to fostering accessible, anti-oppressive herbalism and cultivating connection to each other and the land through deep ecological conversation. We are nestled in the tree-line between farmland and forest, right beside the creek on traditional Shekomeko land in Pine Plains, NY.
We practice Bioregionalism.
This means that we aim to give back to the land as much as we take from it, if not more. We believe in plant and relationship tending and being in conversation and communion with the land, rather than continuing on with the linear, extractive, dissociative ways of so much of modern society and production. We grow and harvest and make our medicine only from plants within our bioregion, limiting our reliance on herbs and transportation from afar. We are constantly adapting to make as small of a footprint as possible and always considering our impact, ecologically and socially, challenging our internalized biases around plants and purism and healing. We consider our ancestry at every turn and aim to make reparations to the land and its original people in all that we do.
Changing the way we think about health
Hannah has been working with clients for over a decade, offering herbal care and connection to support others’ health in a way that both centres their choices and experiences and elevates health autonomy. An herbal consultation is an opportunity to lean deeper into herbal medicine and integrate herbs into your life with a knowledgable, clinical herbalist as a resource and guide. In these one on one sessions, you’ll work collaboratively to isolate health concerns and create a plan that works with you, your body, your lifestyle, integrating custom-formulated herbs into your day-to-day to support and serve.
“In the next century
or the one beyond that,
they say,
are valleys, pastures,
we can meet there in peace
if we make it.
To climb these coming crests
one word to you, to
you and your children:
stay together
learn the flowers
go light”
Earth as Medicine, Relationship as Reciprocity
Our medicine is made in small, seasonal batches from ethically wildcrafted and organically grown plants. Land stewardship is a pillar of our apothecary work. We prioritize weedy and opportunistic plants (AKA invasives) and other naturalized plants of our european ancestral medicine practices that grow in abundance on the land we care for. We never take plants that are rare or delicate from their natural ecosystems and we grow everything else ourselves or purchase it from local organically-growing herb farmers. In our every move as medicine-makers we aim to give back to the earth and our community a little more each time.