Lifestyle Branding Session in Rochester, NY | If there’s one person in this city that I look to for advice on anything related to gardening or natural remedies, it’s Jenna @wildurbanliving

When we first moved to Rochester and I started growing our backyard garden, I was clueless about when to plant, what to plant, what was native and what was not, pests to look out for, etc etc. I was set on having a 100% organic garden but I had no idea what I was doing, for the most part. I grew up in S. Florida and many of the plants that grow here do not grow there, and vice versa. Luckily, Jenna and her family live just 2 blocks away and she’s been growing bountiful flowers, herbs, vegetables, and chickens in their backyard homestead in North Winton Village Rochester, NY for almost a decade.

If I saw a bug that I couldn’t identify, I’d text Jenna. Or an unknown ‘weed’ pop in the garden, I’d text Jenna. If I needed to know what the heck was eating my broccoli, you guessed it, Jenna to the rescue! She’s extremely generous with her knowledge and is always happy to help a fellow gardener in need.

So naturally, I jumped at the opportunity to photograph Jenna in her natural element, in her garden, and in her home studio where she makes skin-healing salves (I use her salve literally every single day!) and herbal teas. The morning of our session I arrived as she was getting ready to harvest calendula and lavender flowers from her backyard. Her two kids joined us and they played with the backyard chickens. Jenna brought the freshly harvested flowers inside to her studio to prep for drying and infusing in various oils. You walk into her studio find shelves & shelves stocked full herbal remedy books, and dozens of jars of various dried herbs. It’s her very own home apothecary! Some of the herbs are ready for making delicious tea and others are infusing in oil to make salve. Each jar is labeled with when & where she harvested the plant, and she picked a few that were ready and I watched as she made some fresh salve with local beeswax she sources from the Finger Lakes region in NY. It was SO FUN to document her entire process, from harvest to finished product, during our photo session.

If you’re looking for some stellar botanical products made with the highest quality local ingredients, look no further than Jenna. Follow her on IG @wildurbanliving and keep an eye out for her restocks! Your skin will thank me, I promise.