Our Philosophy

 

 The Philly Herb Hub is a free community apothecary, currently available to Black folks in Philly. We provide free herbs and free workshops through a mutual aid network with local growers, medicine makers, and herb enthusiasts.

As organizers, the long-term sustainability of the project rests on relationships—not only with the land and the plants, but also between growers and people accessing the medicine.

We’re committed to keeping herbs and medicine accessible as a consistent practice, so that the Hub can exist as a reliable and stable resource for Black people, for as long as possible. 

  Since January 2021, the Philly Herb Hub has distributed 6,500 tinctures, tea blends, salves, dried single herbs, and elixirs to 550 Black Philadelphians and their communities. To do this, we’ve created a circuit of reparatory mutual aid: larger-scale farmers and growers provide dried herbs and bottled medicine to a broad community of Black herb enthusiasts, practicing herbalists, and teachers.

Providing equitable access started with building a working alternative to the ways that herbs and education are sourced and offered under capitalism. We move beyond ideology, putting anti-capitalist beliefs into practice. We encourage ourselves, and our community to slow down; to move at the speed of our own energy and capacity. We believe in the redistribution of resources as a necessity for economic and environmental justice. The Hub reduces waste by acting as a container for the overflow of farmers’ plants and medicine. We focus on relationships with, and respect for, the plants, instead of viewing them as “things” to consume. Offering free herbal medicine and free education, acknowledges everyone’s right to viable options for their health.