About

Yvette lived and worked in California as an environmental designer in restoration and education before returning to Cape Town to achieve a master’s in Landscape Architecture. Yvette spent five years in the Cederberg mountain restoring an old golf course to a thriving plant and animal sanctuary and enlivening a crumbling tourism resort back to a popular destination. 

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After a move to the Klein Karoo, Yvette heads up the reviving of the Karoolkie farm in Barrydale, where she started the Yamù medicinal and tea gardens to further reconnect culture with ecology in continuing expanded ways. 

On the back of her experiences, she has founded Rethinktheland, a company devoted to enlivening mismanaged land and reconnecting culture with ecology. As a production label, she founded Yamù Botanicals, where she formulates medicinal and healing products and essential oils from plants grown on restored land. 

At Barrydale in Bloom, Yvette will host a session on soil regeneration with medicinal plants. She will share processes of restoring soil in harmony with the cycles of nature, drawing from her experiences from Rethinktheland projects. Yamù Botanicals will have a limited display of indigenous products for sale, including dried herbs, medicinal teas and essential oils.

She will also host a guided tour of the Yamù Medicinal Gardens @ Karoolkie, including a demonstration of the essential oil distillation process.