Land Based Jawns

05/10/2026

On Mama Dawn & Composting Grief...
(Post 3/3)

As and I gathered upstairs at , I felt a soft yet strong urge that my mom wanted to take up space in this room. Not only who she was, but specifically who she was to me. Here, I give my grief permission to be big and loud, recognizing how it intertwines and dances with love. Like the taproot of a burdock plant, my grief and love for my momma run deep.

This poem is dedicated to my mom, Mama Dawn, and to all the Black mommas who could not live their softest sweetest lives.

What does it mean to compost your grief,
To turn the darkest parts of your existence
into a material so rich in nutrients,
warmth,
organic matter,
that it can’t help but birth new life,

To sit with and face your shadows
and your pain;
To have them envelop you
like a seed
buried deep in the earth
until it emerges as abundance realized

Somewhere in a garden by the river
Or in the space between forest and ocean
Grief metabolizes,
it alchemizes,
it changes shape
A seed
Given to the earth,
Carried and transmuted
by beings who walk between worlds
Washed by water
Carving a path for joy’s return.

This room is curated to be that for you. The medicine you need may come through a whispered prayer. Or a card pulled from the Harvest of Survival deck . It may come as an uncontrollable sob. Or a much needed conversation and hug from whomever you’re here with. Regardless of how your medicine arrives, the water and plants in this room are here to help you release what needs to be released and move what needs to move. Let them if you are ready.

Happy Mother’s Day to the woman who made me, Dawn K. Kipkin. I miss you every day.

Happy Mother’s DWREN RENE the mamas. We honor you.

💐💐💐

Photos by 🌻

The books in photo 4 have been powerful supports on my journey. Check them out if you feel called.

Authors are:
r.bird

05/08/2026

On Motherwort & the Medicines…

When I first entered this room with Vashti, I felt clear that Motherwort would be our guide. Supportive for both sexual and cardiac health, she is known to connect the heart and the uterus, helping us to heal the heartache and grief carried in our wombs. Motherwort gently encourages us to heal inherited trauma. This trauma is rooted in violence against women, and especially Black women. Like the pain inflicted upon Lucy, Anarcha, and Betsey, we often store this trauma in our wombs, passing it down through generations if left unaddressed.

But our bodies and wombs don’t only carry wounds. They also carry the wisdom of our mothers, foremothers, and ancestral lineages. The three medicines who also guide this room are “Momma Wounds”, “Momma Wisdom”, and “Be Gentle with Me” each containing Motherwort as the mother herb. As their names indicate, they aid us in healing imbalances connected to mothering - whether that be our relationships to our mothers, grandmothers, or children - and support with connecting to our Divine Feminine, nourishing, yin energies. Energy that I and many of us need right now.

Photos by 🌻

Museum tours are on Saturdays. Have you seen and visited yet? What did you do think, feel, or experience?

05/06/2026

The Colored Girls Museum x Land Based Jawns (Post 1/3)

On Lineage and Practice…

For The Colored Girls Museum current exhibit, Land Based Jawns Creator Dr. Ashley B. Gripper was invited to co-curate “Quiet As Its Kept” in collaboration with ceramicist Margery Cedano.

The room honors Lucy and the Mothers of Gynecology, three enslaved Black women who were forced to undergo painful and invasive surgeries without care or consideration of their needs.

Quiet As Its Kept is curated as a healing space and live apothecary to provide the protection and medicine that Black women and girls deserve, have systemically been denied, and have historically provided for each other. Throughout the room, you’ll find Cedano’s intricately crafted water vessels joining forces with Dr. Grip’s intuitively guided medicines, brought together to help nourish and heal BodyMindSpirit imbalances. Read Ashley’s herbal-artist statement below and over the next few posts.

🌺🌺🌺

I am Dr. Ashley B. Gripper, the eldest child of Dawn Kipkin and Paul Gripper III, from the lines of the Halls, Clarks, Kipkins, Thompsons, Grippers, Finneys, Lees, and Barlows. I carry the wisdom and power of these lineages in my spiritual herbalism practice.

As a spiritual herbalist trained under the tutelage of teachers like Empress Karen M. Rose and Chris Bolden-Newsome, I receive messages and wisdom from Mama Earth, my ancestors, and guides to translate into the medicine my community needs. To listen and hear from Spirit and the Earth has required me to slow, soften, and be still. In this space, I am learning what the voice of my own intuition sounds like.

My art form is intuitive curation. Through Land Based Jawns, I create spaces for safety, softness, and connection. When we feel safe enough to be soft, we are more likely to take off our masks and witness ourselves, allowing us to truly see and experience authentic connection.

Photos by Wren Rene 🌻

Have you experienced the exhibit yet? What did you think and feel?

03/18/2026

Much gratitude to the creative team who made it possible and the land based jawns who gathered with us by the river so that we may share our stories and experiences.

We had a beautiful experience shooting this shoot film a little over a year ago. It certainly was a labor of love and trust 🌺🌺 Support, share, and uplift the work, yall. That’s how it continues

03/02/2026

From the decor and food, to the silent auction and elemental tables, every part and piece of this event was intentional and the result of collective effort and partnerships.

Thank you to our culinary and drink curators, and , for a meal and beverages that took us on a journey of what shaping change tastes like.

Thank you to all who offered donations in the form of candles, flowers, marketing, and your services:

To our day-of volunteers, thank you for your supportive energy and helping to bring all the pieces together so beautifully:

Thank you to our awesome partner , with extra gratitude to Kiersten. It was an absolutely joy working with you to make this happen.

And again to the Planning Committee - thank you for trusting me and the vision that we could bring this ancestor & spirit-guided event to our community.

Sankofa & Ubuntu 💛🌺🌱🌻✨

photos by

02/27/2026

The key to putting on a beautiful event is bringing together beautiful humans. Our speakers, artists, healers, and honorees are some of the warmest, kindest, *realest* folks we know. Thank you for helping us bring the space and event to life with your gifts and offerings.

DJ & Keynote Speaker:

Emcee: Deacon Dr. Shanaé Burch

Artists: Malidelphia (drum), Trapeta Mayson (poetry), Reverend Rhetta (song and drum)

Honorees: Tien Sydnor-Campbell , Kirtrina Baxter, Chris Bolden-Newsome, and Nyambi Royster (in memoriam), accepted by her sons.

We are so grateful for each of you 🌻🤲🏽✨

Photos by

02/24/2026

For us, last year was about coming together to Shape Change. We started the year with an intimate book club co-led by several of our members on Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Talents. We also hosted Sunday Church in the Garden gatherings where we deepened our relationships with Mama Earth and each other over the course of 4 months.

Perhaps the highlight of the year was the Shape Change Gala, co-organized and co-created by 11 of our incredible members: Mieka, Justina, Brittany, Tanisha, Folasshade, Nia, Holli, Erica, Chef Tonii, Tanya, and Chef Dobson. Thank you for the love, spirit, and dedication that you poured into our collective dream. It was all that it was because of each of you 💛

Although the event was a while ago, the joy, nourishment, and medicine of the Shape Change Gala have carried us. To all those who shared that magical space with us, we hope that you also smiled as you remembered the time.

With love.

💐💐💐

Photos by

09/22/2025

So grateful to Shape Change with you! 🌺 -

Give thanks for an absolutely beautiful and soul-nourishing time at the Shape Change Gala on Friday. From our artist-healers - Malidelphia, Reverend Rhetta, Trapeta B. Mayson, Deacon Dr. Shanaé Burch, and DJ Dandara, to the culinary and cocktail curation by Chef Tonii Hicks and Erica Mines, to our ...

09/17/2025

🌻🪷 THERE ARE 20 TICKETS LEFT🚨 SALES END TODAY

🌱Ashley is a grower, healer, herbalist, nurturer, teacher, and scholar. She began her formal agricultural training at Sankofa Community Farm in Southwest Philadelphia with mentorship from Chris Bolden-Newsome. She gained much of her organizing experience as a member of Soil Generation with mentorship and guidance from Kirtrina Baxter. Ashley is also a graduate of Sacred Vibes Spiritual Herbalism Apprenticeship Program under the mentorship of Empress Karen M. Rose. 

Currently, Ashley is an assistant professor at Drexel University’s Dornsife School of Public Health and a faculty member at the Ubuntu Center on Racism, Global Movements, and Population Health Equity. There, she focuses on supporting students and researching the ways we remember, return to, and practice land-based ancestral wisdom.
 
Land Based Jawns was created by Ashley in the summer of 2020 and officially launched on October 14, 2020. The business and organization were established as a result Ashley processing and composting the grief associated with her parents’ deaths and injustices throughout the world. After reading Octavia Butler’s Parables, she felt that OEB left a roadmap for survival and community building in the face of war, genocide, and climate disasters. While first using the novels’ stories to guide her personal practice of safety and survival, Ashley realized that there were many others in her community seeking the same sense of safety, protection, skill-building, and healing. Today, Land Based Jawns has grown to provide healing and educational services in the form of medicines, curated events, skillshares, workshops, and book clubs.