Alumni Offerings
Sacred Offerings from our Gaia Community
Honouring the lineages of medicine carriers before us.
De La Tierra Botanicals ~ Irischa Valentin
Irischa is a Boricua community herbalist and educator committed to sharing herbalism with oppressed communities as an expression of social justice, sovereignty, and connecting. Irischa’s herbal knowledge integrates folk medicine, remembering our relationship with plants for self-healing, relearning the ways of our ancestors, and earth-based spiritual practices. Irischa created De La Tierra Botanicals, providing herbal consultations, workshops, and healing circles, remembering how our ancestors connected to Mother Earth. De La Tierra is committed to creating opportunities for communities that are marginalized to have alternative, holistic healthcare access. They offer heart-centered, amor sharing plant-spirit medicine & transformation practice in all its forms. https://www.facebook.com/delatierrabotanicals/
School of the Sacred Wild ~ Marysia Miernowska
Marysia Miernowska taught The Gaia School's Sacred Plant Medicine Apprenticeships from 2014-2020 and then launched her own school in 2020. Marysia Miernowska is a teacher, author, Earth activist, green witch, folk herbalist and healer rooted in the Wise Woman Tradition of Healing. Marysia was first introduced to the medicinal properties of native plants by her great grandmother in Poland when she was a child. Drawing on the folk herbalism of her roots and her connection to universal ancestral wisdom, Marysia has traveled extensively studying earth based spirituality and ancient healing practices from different cultures around the world. Marysia apprenticed with Sage Maurer and the Gaia School of Healing and has been practicing sacred plant medicine ever since. Marysia’s passion for permaculture and biodynamic gardening combined with her experience as an Earth activist, community organizer, and designer weaves into her work of cultivating spiritual connection to land, and ripples into action. www.schoolofthesacredwild.com
Stinging Nettle Brujxs Healing Collective ~ Including Gaia School alumni Chalaun Lomax, Michelle M. Evans, Anita Sintes, Irischa Valentin, and xochitlcoatl bellx
The Stinging Nettle Brujxs Healing Collective is a call to healing in its most radical, decolonized, ancestral-vibing way. It is a collective that strives to create visibility of ancient healing and cultural traditions. They are led by multigenerational Black, Indigenous, POC femme-identified vessels who are artists, mamas, brujxs, educators, healers, yerberas, students, yogis, and more. The Brujxs collective is committed to the liberation and healing justice of Black, Indigenous, Latinx, POC communities, and our supporting allies. Stinging Nettle Brujxs Healing Collective uses skill-shares, workshops, pop-up clinics, community events, herbal walks, conferences, and retreats to co-create spaces for wellness to transcend into medicine. https://www.facebook.com/brujxshealingcollective/
Milk & Honey Herbs ~ Jade Alicandro Mace
Jade weaves a love of bioregionally abundant herbs and kitchen medicine into her work as a community and clinical herbalist. Her work as an herbalist revolves around self and community empowerment, equal access, community resilience, promoting local and plant-based healthcare, and the sharing and spreading of herbal knowledge. Jade teaches herbalism avidly throughout the northeast and leads apprenticeships, workshops, and online classes in bioregional herbalism. Jade sees folks in her clinical practice for consultations in Greenfield, MA and co-founded the Community Herbal Clinic. Her writings have been published extensively, and she has taught at conferences including the American Herbalists Guild Symposium, Northeast Permaculture Convergence, Radherb, Herbstalk, and the Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA) conference. https://www.milkandhoneyherbs.com
Heart Centered Herbals ~ Kristen Jewell
Kristen offers plant medicine workshops, energy healing sessions, and sacred botanical remedies in Virginia. She runs Heart Centered Herbals, offering sacred products and workshops for the heart soul, mind and body. From simple tinctures to vibrational elixirs, Kristen creates herbal medicines from locally grown, ethically harvested plants. Heart Centered Herbals was created in honor of our connection to nature and in order to provide herbal blends that consider the whole being. Check out their website to book a personalized session, attend a workshop, or inquire about herbal remedies. Kristen also offers women’s monthly circles to empower them to remember the ways of the ancient sisterhood. https://www.heartcenteredherbals.com
Seed, Root, & Bloom - xochitlcoatl bellx
xochitlcoatl bello is a two spirit queer feminista, brujita, abolitionista, mexica, angelina, artivist, birthkeeper, truthteller + plant mama. xochitlcoatl bleeds sacredness across turtle island through la mala yerba, a nomadic project creating bipoc healing containers in hood + res communities. their work is rooted in liberating the collective through ancestor remembrance one plant + one ceremony at a time. xochitlcoatl offers bipoc connections to sacred through herbal + ancestor journeys, herbal immersions, one-on-one sessions + wisdomshops that center accessibility, ancestor + freedom in this life time. visit lamalayerba.com and follow @lamalayerba on instagram to weave with them today.
Herbalist Uprising & Earth Eros Embodied ~ Anna Booth Cohen
Anna Booth Cohen is an herbalist offering virtual and in-person workshops, sexual empowerment retreats, private herbal consultations, and handmade herbal products. She combines her knowledge of western herbalism, plant spirit medicine, and heart-based perception of the knowing field of consciousness to craft her herbal practice. Anna specializes in resourcing sexual empowerment through herbalism and ancestral resources. She co-created Earth Eros Embodied, an experience designed to create sacred space for conscious sexual education, with sex educator and Desire Catalyst Elise Bish. Anna’s offerings are grounded in her Queer and Jewish identities and her deep love of the Earth. https://www.herbalistuprising.com/
Jane Metzger - The Herbal Academy
Jane Metzger works as a lead within the Education Department of the Herbal Academy, where she is involved with course development projects and manages The Herbarium membership site and plant monograph database. Jane joined the Herbal Academy in 2014 to pursue her love of herbalism, writing, and photography. She helps to develop course curriculum, edits articles and plant monographs, answers student questions, and puts her project management skills to work in service to the plants and herbalism education. https://theherbalacademy.com/team/
Simples Apothecary ~ Traci Donat
Traci runs the The Simples Apothecary, an herbal tonic shop selling plant medicines created by a diverse community of highly skilled herbalists. Simples Apothecary offers tinctures, elixirs, beauty products, and herbal offerings have each been hand selected for their uniqueness and efficacy, offering an interactive way to explore the gifts of these sacred plants. All of the plants grown in the Simples garden are cultivated with organic and/or biodynamic practices and are fertilized with the composted plant matter that is a product of our Santa Monica tonic shop. https://www.simplestonics.com/
Radicle Love & Susu Healing Collective - Naomi Moody
Naomi Moody offers a radicle community herbal ally-ship for people of color looking to re-connect to and heal their ancestral lineage from inter-generational trauma. Naomi also co-runs the Susu Healing Collective, a healing center for commUNITY reciporocity towards the healing, affirming, and liberation of black, indigenous, people of color, and their allies. Susu offers a sliding scale (low to no cost for BIPOC) apothocary, a safe space for bipoc youth and community members, weekly classes for adults, sound baths, medicine making, herbal growing classes, headwrapping classes, ancestral, ritual, ceremonial workshops, decolonized yoga classes, reiki sessions, somatic therapy, and sound therapy. www.susuheals.com and http://www.radiclelove.com/
Thirteen Moons Healing & Tea is the Way ~ Ania Gruca
Ania Gruca is a polish born woman teaching and facilitating the wise woman tradition of herbal medicine on the shores of a coastal town in Beverly MA. Ania has deep roots connecting with her traditions and lineage in Eastern European herbalism and folk medicine. She is the founder of Thirteen Moons Healing, supporting clients and community through sacred plant medicine, energy and body work. She is co-founder of the North Shore Herbal Network, an initiative to start a community of herbalists and enthusiasts about the many aspects of plants on the north shore in Massachusetts. Currently Ania is co visioning her company Tea is the Way, creating herbal tea blends focused on supporting local, organic and sustainable agriculture. https://teaistheway.com/
Nature’s Pharmacy, Spiritist House Ismael’s Land in Brazil ~ Fabio Carmona, MD, MSc, PhD.
Fabio is a Brazilian physician (pediatrician) who has been working with herbal medicine since 2008. When he came to Boston for a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard Medical School in 2011, he studied with Sage at The Gaia School of Healing. Fabio is part of the faculty at the Ribeirao Preto Medical School, University of Sao Paulo, and practices herbal medicine at Nature’s Pharmacy, Spiritist House Ismael’s Land. They offer free medical appointments and free herbal medicines as well as spiritual lectures and treatments. They have a collection of around 400 species of medicinal plants from all over the world, and seven physicians see 1500 patients per year. Their team of pharmacists, biotechnologists, agronomists and other volunteers produce 1.5 ton of medicines per year (powders, tinctures, fluid extracts, syrups, soaps, shampoos, capsules etc). They also write books on herbal medicine and do basic, preclinical, and clinical research on many plants for several human diseases. They are currently collaborating with the government to improve national regulations on herbal medicine and by next year are opening their Botanical Garden.
Heartspace Herbals & Garden Design ~ Lauren Almquist
Lauren is a community herbalist, gardener, and landscape designer. From a magical, abundant garden or backyard sanctuary, to an interactive, educational, shared public space, Lauren works with people and plants to design and create nourishing, abundant spaces. She collaborates with community organizations like the Boston Food Forest Coalition to expand access to nourishing and medicinal plants, creating space for individuals and communities to connect with plants, the earth, themselves, and each other. Lauren offers garden and landscape design services, plant spirit herbal medicine workshops, retreats, and classes. https://www.heartspaceherbals.com
Institute of Medicinal Herbs in Austria - Julia Rastelli
Julia is an herbalist, somatic movement coach, and teacher of sacred plant medicine. She has a doctorate in biology, and has worked in cancer research for 10 years in Germany and at Harvard University. Even then she understood that every disease has its roots in the entire organism and can not be considered or solved locally. She understood the human body is a miracle of self-healing and wished to understand what might hinder the healing process. These considerations led Julia to search for the mental and spiritual causes of diseases, and to discover alternative healing. Julia completed apprenticeships in Plant Spirit Medicine with Sage at The Gaia School of Healing in New England and then in Costa Rica. This triggered a deep spiritual change in her. She then finished her academic medical career, began her own research studies, and founded the Institute of Medicinal Herbs in Austria to pass on her knowledge. https://www.heilkraut.rastelli.at
Luna Roots ~ Brook Frost
Brooke runs the popular Luna Roots, a luxurious herbal body & skin care line from the woodlands of Vermont. Luna Roots is a sensorial experience in ritual beauty, offering small batch handcrafted botanical body care. Brooke follows her bliss in Vermont where she wildcrafts and grows medicinals to be made into magical skin care products, healing hydrosols, and skin potions. View her sacred products at www.lunaroots.com or follow her on instagram at https://www.instagram.com/lunarootsmagick/
The Gaia Hive ~ Julie Feddes
Julie Gaia lives and thrives in Ontario, Canada where she runs the Gaia Hive. She opened her outdoor folk herbalism school in 2018. Each year there are 6 month mentorships (5 weekends in total) to help folks connect with their innate wild selves & the plant peoples.
Julie offers Plant Spirit Healing Sessions & private mentorships upon request.
All classes are hands on and heart based.
Herbstalk & Flower Folk Herbs ~ Steph Zabel
Steph is an herbalist and botanical educator who helps urban dwellers connect with the plant world. She teaches seasonally-oriented herbal classes that focus on local plants, herbal medicine-making techniques, and plant identification. Steph is the creator of Herbstalk, a grassroots, Boston-area herbal conference. Herbstalk hosts classes on herbal and holistic health topics, offers urban plant walks, and brings together herbal crafters & artisans from across New England and beyond. Their spirited events inspire and educate people about the art and science of herbalism. http://www.flowerfolkherbs.com/
Pura Luna Women’s Apothecary - Ashe Kelly-Brown
Ashe and her wife Christin are owners of Pura Luna Women’s Apothecary, a sacred space for women of all ages to come together to learn, heal and grow. Pura Luna includes an herbal apothecary, healthcare boutique, steam treatment room, community room, and a healing garden. Pura Luna offers handcrafted herbal extracts and tonics specifically formulated to meet your various health needs and for preventative care. All of their herbal medicinals were made in-house or by other women-owned ventures. They offer several events and workshops every month that help enlighten, encourage healing, celebrate and educate. http://puralunaapothecary.com/
Persephone's Path - Kathryn Solie
Kathryn offers online and in person classes journeying with the spirits of poisonous plants, teaching plant spirit communication for healing the soul. She is known as a "poisonous" plant educator, offering meditation classes and workshops on poisonous plants and various spiritual topics. Kathryn also works one on one with people looking to remember their authentic Selves through the use of tarot readings, dream interpretation, herbal medicine, intuition building, mindfulness, shamanic journeying, creative expression, and meditation. http://www.kathrynsolie.com/poisonous-plant-medicine
Heart Grown Wild - SantaLena Groves
Santalena is the Creator and founder of Heart Grown Wild, an organic, plant-based skincare company created to help foster an intrinsic connection to nature and the body through the beauty and art of self-care rituals. Santalena crafts hydrosols, face toners, body oils, honey masks, serums, strand and bath soaks. Santalena’s dynamic background of mental health social work and a love for plants, nature and alternative modalities helped formulate her herbal skincare products. It is her hope that each bottle act as a portal, bringing the beauty and connection of the natural world into your skin. She hopes to inspire an element of ritual into our daily skincare routines with each product she creates. https://heartgrownwild.com/
Love Alive ~ Eden Love
Eden works as a health coach and owns Love Alive - a high-vibrational raw living foods company for ecstatic super-beings! Love Alive crafts their foods with love and care, and the highest-vibrational and most nutrient-dense superfoods on the planet. They use the highest-quality organic ingredients and infuse their foods with the vibration of love and bliss through chanting and sacred music. Eden creates amazing herbal superfood chakra honeys, raw chocolates, nori chips, kale chips, raw pies & other decadent treats, raw nutrient-dense snacks, and raw herbal body care products! LoveAliveforLife@gmail.com
