Last year, when LaVanna Wrobley of Ladue was running as a Republican candidate for state representative in Missouri’s 99th District, she’d shake hands with voters by day, then retreat to the quiet of her garden at night. She’d snip lettuce, pluck a tomato, assemble a big salad for dinner. She never found time during the campaign to do things she normally does, such as dehydrate herbs or freeze sugar snap peas. But when possible, she’d slip away to what she calls her “oasis of calm.”
Wrobley grew up in Ohio. Her parents kept a large home garden there. Since moving to St. Louis, she’s always had one of her own, even while raising her two children and growing Madyon, her consulting business. A few years ago, Wrobley sketched a new garden layout on graph paper, then hired a freelance carpenter to bring her ideas for arbors, a fence, and benches to life. She completed the master gardener program at the Missouri Botanical Garden, adding some intellectual heft to what she calls her “intuitive” plant-management style.
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Her bid for public office didn’t succeed, but the garden endures—and this year, Wrobley hopes to expand by growing squash and purple cauliflower. She also plans to rise early, as she always does, and take a cup of coffee out to the garden bench. “I know people say this all the time,” she says “but all of your senses are on fire. You can hear the birds, and the flutter of the butterflies. You can smell the tomatoes on the vine, the marigolds in the pots. So when you sit there, you are really in the moment.”
