Flower Company Mentoring At-Risk Youth (Interview w/ Quilen Blackwell)

Quilen Blackwell is the cofounder of the Chicago EcoHouse and Southside Blooms, organizations dedicated to eliminating poverty through sustainability. He’s the grandson of Arkansas sharecroppers who moved to Milwaukee so his grandfather could secure a factory job in the aftermath of the Civil Rights Movement when racial tensions were high. 

After earning his Bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Blackwell went on to serve in the Peace Corps in Thailand. When he returned to the United States, he enrolled in a Chicago ministry school where God led him to commit to a life of community service.  

He began by tutoring high school students in Englewood, where he saw the devastating impacts of inner-city poverty. Eventually he and his partner (now wife), Hannah Bonham Blackwell founded the Chicago Eco House to transform blighted urban lots into sustainable flower farms. That grew into Southside Blooms, which provides jobs on these farms and in a flower shop to at-risk youth. 

Quilen is always amazed to see how God’s hand moved through the suffering his grandfather endured working the land in the Jim Crow South all the way to the freedom he now enjoys and shares with others. 

https://southsideblooms.com 

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