Speaker 1: Hey there, I'm Manga. They're a co host of Part
Speaker 1: Time Genius, one of the founders of Mental Floss, and
Speaker 1: this is Humans Growing Stuff, a collaboration from My Heart
Speaker 1: Radio and your friends at Miracle Grow. Our goal is
Speaker 1: to make this the most human show about plants that
Speaker 1: you'll ever listen to, and along the way, we'll share
Speaker 1: inspiring stories, tips and tricks to nurture your plant addiction,
Speaker 1: and just enough science to make you sound like an expert.
Speaker 1: So we are on summer break right now, but the
Speaker 1: truth is, my producer Molly and I can't stop our
Speaker 1: plant addiction, so we're bringing you some sunny mini episodes
Speaker 1: to enjoy before we return with a brand new season.
Speaker 1: Throughout this summer, we'll be dropping incredible stories from growers,
Speaker 1: fun advice we get from experts, and we'll even be
Speaker 1: bringing you along on our field trips as we hunt
Speaker 1: all over Brooklyn for a Polka dot plant, sample hot
Speaker 1: sauces from a community garden, and try to make friends
Speaker 1: with some worms on Governor's Island. It was a tall task.
Speaker 1: In this bonus episode, we're sharing our interview with Scott Kane,
Speaker 1: founder of the Instagram account Boys with Plants, Scott considers
Speaker 1: himself a plant nerd, and started his account after he
Speaker 1: and a friend James, exchange a few d ms of
Speaker 1: their favorite photos of men with plants on social media.
Speaker 1: Boys with Plants now has more than two followers and
Speaker 1: has grown into a book, magazine, and calendar. I called
Speaker 1: up Scott earlier this year for our episode Plant Daddy's Miracle,
Speaker 1: Burrows and the Seeds of Modern Masculinity. We talked about
Speaker 1: the importance of house plants and design and how the
Speaker 1: plant Daddy movement has created a new sense of community online.
Speaker 1: Hey Scott, are you there? Yeah? Hi, how you doing Hi?
Speaker 1: It's so nice to be chatting with you. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: the chat to you too. Thanks for so oh. I
Speaker 1: know one of the main reasons we wanted to chat
Speaker 1: with you is your Boys with Plants account is widely
Speaker 1: considered one of the first plant daddy platforms on on
Speaker 1: social media. Can you tell us a little bit about
Speaker 1: how you decided to start this in two thousand six sure? Sure, yeah,
Speaker 1: two thousand and sixteen, So it's been nearly five years.
Speaker 1: I can't believe it's been that long, but it's it
Speaker 1: gives me a lot of joys. So it sort of
Speaker 1: propels me to keep it, to keep working at it.
Speaker 1: But I started an Instagram page called Tropical Loco, which
Speaker 1: was just documenting my my plants on my balcony really
Speaker 1: and and there weren't that many accounts like that around
Speaker 1: at the time. Um, and it got a bit of attention.
Speaker 1: And I've met some guys and girls all over the
Speaker 1: all over the world through that account, and we chatted
Speaker 1: and got to know each other a little better. And
Speaker 1: I used to chat to my friends James in Singapore.
Speaker 1: We used to share images between ourselves of sort of
Speaker 1: guys with their plants, particularly that were particularly handsome and
Speaker 1: just three D M and and then I sort of
Speaker 1: thought this actually might make a good a good Instagram
Speaker 1: page on its own. Maybe somebody else might might be
Speaker 1: interested in checking this out. So, um, so I started
Speaker 1: Boys with Plants. And I've heard that your mom also
Speaker 1: has really with plants. My mom does, She's been you know,
Speaker 1: my my love of plants really came from mom initially,
Speaker 1: so so I was, I was. She got me on
Speaker 1: board with the plants, and I got her on board
Speaker 1: with the Instagram. So what was your intention with boys
Speaker 1: with Plants? When he started that that account really just
Speaker 1: to show amazing pictures of high quality images of guys
Speaker 1: with their plants. I don't think I really had much
Speaker 1: more of a comment when I started it than just
Speaker 1: showing something that didn't seem to exist on Instagram at
Speaker 1: the time, and I didn't really expect anyone to really
Speaker 1: be interested there. But as it went along, and particularly
Speaker 1: when it got um it got sort of picked up
Speaker 1: on some American newspapers, and the Washington Post and New
Speaker 1: York Times picked it up, and Vogue magazine wrote an
Speaker 1: article about it that started to get a lot of attention,
Speaker 1: which is quite amount, Like I just was quite unexpected.
Speaker 1: Um yeah, So it all chugged along from there really,
Speaker 1: and yeah, obviously it's this van diagram of interest, but
Speaker 1: I had read that it was. It was much more
Speaker 1: focused on plants with boys as a bit of a candy.
Speaker 1: Initially exactly, the boys are a bonus. I always I
Speaker 1: get a lot of pictures where there's a bit of
Speaker 1: a plant in the background and some muscle guys standing
Speaker 1: in front of the camera holding the camera, and I'm
Speaker 1: always saying to them, sorry, the boys, the just the bonus.
Speaker 1: It has to be about plants, has to be plant focused.
Speaker 1: So what would you say is your definition of a
Speaker 1: plant daddy. Ah, good question. I think somebody who just
Speaker 1: has a keen interest in in plants beyond just getting
Speaker 1: a plan and to look nice in a home, or
Speaker 1: you know, maybe they've given a plant and they're like,
Speaker 1: this is an opportunity to photograph myself looking good with
Speaker 1: a plant. An actual plant daddy is someone who actually
Speaker 1: cares for plants, and choosing to quote yourself a plant
Speaker 1: daddy is part of it as well. Yeah, so what
Speaker 1: is the plant daddy community all about? I think it's
Speaker 1: sharing a common interest. It's about reaching out to people.
Speaker 1: It's a connection that's just a way of connecting through
Speaker 1: growing and and giving advice and through collecting in a way,
Speaker 1: you know, it's just an initial common interest that brings
Speaker 1: guys together people together. So you say on your website
Speaker 1: that when you set out to make the Instagram page,
Speaker 1: quote the whole idea of an Instagram page featuring them
Speaker 1: with something unexpected and truly original. And can you talk
Speaker 1: a little bit about why at the time, boys and
Speaker 1: plants might be new or unheard on the internet together. Yeah,
Speaker 1: people don't realize. But before boys and Plants existed, they
Speaker 1: earn any dedicated pages, and it was quite subversive to
Speaker 1: have pictures of guys with plants. At that time, there
Speaker 1: were quite a few girls with plants or just just
Speaker 1: general people with plants pages. Yeah, when I started Boys
Speaker 1: with Plants, it wasn't really around. It was quite hard
Speaker 1: to find pictures initially to even post on the page.
Speaker 1: Obviously I had the d MS between me and James,
Speaker 1: which is one of the places I went to initially,
Speaker 1: and I collected a few that way, but yeah, they
Speaker 1: just weren't really around, and it was quite hard to find.
Speaker 1: And it's quite exciting now to get more than a
Speaker 1: hundred submissions every day and the exactly what I asked
Speaker 1: for that you know that they're they're really amazing images
Speaker 1: and beautifully photographed and following my tips as well. So
Speaker 1: it's it's really nice to see how that's changed. So
Speaker 1: one of the things we noticed was under frequently asked
Speaker 1: questions page. People always ask what type of boys do
Speaker 1: you feature? And and your answer is all of them.
Speaker 1: I do get asked a lot about why I don't
Speaker 1: post any bigger guys or older guys, and my answer
Speaker 1: is I get so few submissions and I'm really trying
Speaker 1: to encourage more submissions from all different sized people. Like previously,
Speaker 1: one of a bigger guy took a picture which I featured,
Speaker 1: and it was one of the most popular pictures on
Speaker 1: the page. I think it got over fifteen thousand likes.
Speaker 1: It was amazing. Unfortunately, I think people look at the
Speaker 1: page and they see so much of the muscle guys
Speaker 1: and so much of the of the shirts off and
Speaker 1: all that sort of stuff, and then they maybe they
Speaker 1: feel like the pages not for them, the pages really
Speaker 1: for everyone. So one of the things we've noticed is
Speaker 1: that so much of the plant Daddy movement seems to
Speaker 1: be about bringing plants into spaces to liven things up
Speaker 1: or to bring warmth to a rumor area. You know,
Speaker 1: we're wondering, how do you think interior design has been
Speaker 1: heightened by this edition of adding living pieces to spaces.
Speaker 1: I love the way plants soften a room. They stay
Speaker 1: soften and warmer space. You know, they break the hard
Speaker 1: edges of um of If you think about a bookshelf,
Speaker 1: it's square and it's hard on the edges. You place
Speaker 1: a plant on it that trickles down the side of
Speaker 1: the of the of the bookshelf. It breaks up all
Speaker 1: those edges and those spaces, and it connects the connects
Speaker 1: the different the different boxes. I guess you could say
Speaker 1: of the bookshelf. Um. So I think it's just the
Speaker 1: way that it's visually looks glossy and alive and and
Speaker 1: um and yeah, just the fact that is living is
Speaker 1: a big thing. But also breaking all those those hard
Speaker 1: edges of architecture. I think that's that's one thing that
Speaker 1: plants do in an interior. You know, I've seen in
Speaker 1: this Smell magazine interview that you said a plant represents
Speaker 1: optimism and hope for the future, and I wanted to
Speaker 1: hear just a little bit more about that. I think
Speaker 1: that you're an investing something in a plant. You're buying
Speaker 1: this small even large plant, any sized plants, and when
Speaker 1: you're buying it, you're expecting it to stay alive. But
Speaker 1: you know you have to put the work in the
Speaker 1: effortence to keep it alive. And so by putting in
Speaker 1: the thought of the time and the love and the
Speaker 1: physical things like the water and the soil and the
Speaker 1: and the fertilizer. Um, you're you're looking forward to your
Speaker 1: looking forward to the future of being with that plants
Speaker 1: and having it as part of your life. Um and yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's part of the optimism. I just want
Speaker 1: to say thank you for taking the time to chat
Speaker 1: with us. It's been really fun to talk. Thank you
Speaker 1: for listening to my rambling appreciate. I want to thank
Speaker 1: Scott Ken again for sharing his story and insights. You
Speaker 1: can follow Boys with Plants on Instagram or visit Boys
Speaker 1: with Plants dot com to learn more force invent your
Speaker 1: own photos. That's it for to Day's bonus episode, but
Speaker 1: check back here again to see more bonus episodes this summer,
Speaker 1: and don't forget no matter what season it is or
Speaker 1: where you're at in your gardening journey, there's some incredible
Speaker 1: resources waiting for you on the Miracle Grow website. Humans
Speaker 1: Growing Stuff is a collaboration from I Heart Radio and
Speaker 1: your friends at Miracle Grow. Our show was written and
Speaker 1: produced by Molly Sosha and Knee Mongy Chatiguler in partnership
Speaker 1: with Ryano Vadia, Daniel Ainsworth, Haley Ericsson, and Garrett Shannon
Speaker 1: of Bancher. Thank you so much for listening