Eliza Blank

For this week's issue on the relationship between millennials and plants, we asked the founder of LES plant store The Sill to share her thoughts on why her generation is increasingly going green. It wasn't until I moved to New York City that I realized how much I needed plants in my life. I grew up in a small Massachusetts college town nestled in the Pioneer Valley—the residents call it “Happy Valley,” probably because it’s so green—where my mother is still an avid gardener. She made sure our home was filled with plants, both indoors and out. I recall terrariums galore and rooms filled with potted ivy, ficus, cactus and euphorbia, most of which are older than me and yet continue to thrive even now. Like most kids, I took it all for granted. I never helped out in the garden and rarely picked up a watering can. It was only in the plants’ absence that I was first able to recognize their positive influence on my life. Not only did my barren NYC apartment not feel like my childhood home, it also didn’t feel like a home at all. Pretty soon, I realized I was missing the comforting and visceral experience of being surrounded by living, breathing greenery. And I’m not alone among my peers. Fellow millennial Maria Failla, the podcaster behind Bloom & Grow Radio, is a self-dubbed “succulent killer turned crazy plant lady.” As she recounts, “During my first five years in NYC, I killed about 20 houseplants that I tried to have in various apartments.” But she felt a call to keep trying: “I