My name is Matilya Njau and I am currently working in Leeds as a horticulturalist. I have a private gardening business looking after domestic gardens as well as running a local community gardening group called the Lincoln Greeners as part of Mafwa Theatre. I also deliver workshops around the city making plant medicine and studying herbs.
At the heart of my practice is helping people reconnect with their immediate surroundings, creating green spaces in difficult places and using gardening and herbal medicine as a vessel to connect with self, ancestors and other human and non-human beings.The questions that drive my work are; what relationships do we need to build with plants in order to address climate and food justice? What do plants teach us about ourselves and others? How do our ancestors speak to us through the non-human world? How can green spaces act as vehicles for connection, rest and therapy?
As a second generation immigrant, the land is how I connect to my motherland and to my family and through this, I’m inspired to help others foster those connections too.
Current Work:
Private Gardener, Leeds
Project Co-ordinator (Lincoln Greeners), Mafwa Theatre
Freelance Workshop Facilitator
Previous Work
Green Engagement Lead and Head Gardener, Mafwa Theatre (2022-23)
Sustainable Garden Assistant, Leeds University Union (2019)
Trainee Gardener, York Gate Garden, Leeds (2018-19)
Qualifications
Diploma in Social and Therapeutic Horticulture, Thrive (2022-Present)
RHS Level 2 Certificate in the Principles of Garden Planning, Establishment and Maintenance, Askham Bryan College (2018)
BA International Relations (First Class), University of Birmingham
First Aid Trained and Insured
Remembrance
In plants I find the way home.
The callings of my Guka echoing through the wind,
Sending messages through the dandelion seeds. Setting roots as they go.
It's not that I never learnt, it's that I have forgotten.
Shifts in time and space have caused this passing of knowledge. It’s still in the wind but those callings are carrying it back with them.
My ancestors are reaching me even if I am thousands of spaces away.
Through the plants I remember. They are the vehicle to belonging, to acceptance.
They are the elders I never met in human form but still know intimately.
*Guka means Grandfather in the Kikuyu language (my mothertongue)
