Hello there, I’m Felicia.

After over a decade in law and public policy, I became a garden developer and designer. My approach to gardens and gardening is about being a ‘good friend’— to both people and planet.

I use ecological principles to develop resilient, thoughtful, and beautiful spaces. More than anything, I know that community education is critical to rethinking and enriching our relationship with the world around us.

Good Friend Ecological Gardens—my home base, lab, and design studio— is situated just uphill from the Mohawk River in Niskayuna, NY. I’m surrounded on two sides by great neighbors, both the second-growth woods and people in my community.

The Gardens are native-forward and combine edible and ornamental landscape into a place where biodiversity and sustainability thrive. The Gardens are many in one, with formal and relaxed spaces, a seed lab, learning garden, and an intensive cut flower farm.

Aside from the wildlife that lives on site year-round and those that pass through, I share the Gardens with my husband, Carl, a luthier and audio engineer; my dog Artie (a.k.a., ‘Mr. Muscles for No Reason’), and Squee, a cat who’s far too intelligent for anyone’s good.

I have completed certificate programs at the New York Botanical Garden, Berkshire Botanical Garden, and the American Horticultural Society, and written on gardening and food culture for Edible: Capital District. In 2023, I was accepted into the Master Gardener Program through Cornell Cooperative Extension and began speaking about ecologically-minded residential garden development. The greatest lessons, however, come from learning to read and respond to the land, and the gardens that have grown alongside me.