CLAIRE CHAMBER’S BIO
Claire Chambers is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Meadow Lab, a public benefit company designing high-performance plant systems like native wildflower meadow sod inspired by nature. She is also the principal of Flowerlands, a small landscape design studio.
After twenty years as an entrepreneur and executive in the world of digital commerce, Claire left to study at New York Botanical Garden’s School of Professional Horticulture, where she received a certificate in landscape design. Today, Claire is focused on advisory, incubation and investment work that supports the broader mission of re-wilding the built world.
Previously, Claire founded and operated Journelle, a woman’s clothing start-up; she led a multi-billion dollar P&L within Walmart; and served as president at Food52, a private-equity backed media & commerce business, where she spearheaded growth across e-commerce, retail, marketing, merchandising, brand partnerships and community. Claire holds a degree in Economics & Studio Art from Wellesley College.
Claire lives in the lower Hudson Valley with her husband and their two young daughters, where she enjoys cooking for family & friends, hiking, growing flowers, and riding horses.
You can learn more about Claire and Meadow Lab at meadowlab.com and on Instagram at @meadowlab.
SHOW NOTES
How growing up in the mountains of southern Oregon and spending time outdoors shaped her appreciation for natural landscapes
How Claire came to horticulture later in life after a long career in business, consulting, and e-commerce
The sabbatical for Claire to reevaluate her prorities
Enrolling in the New York Botanical Garden’s professional program and her intention to take just a few classes but ending up pursuing a full certification
The complexity of landscape design with its spatial, seasonal, and ecological variables
The challenge of teaching plant combinations in a classroom setting and how real-world observation and discovering working formulas like plant layering and combination recipes helped her begin to form planting frameworks
Seeing opportunities in meadow horror stories
Discovering wildflower sod in the UK and began exploring its potential as a scalable technology for American landscapes
Carrie Preston’s wildflower sod at the Philadelphia Flower Show
Explaining how wildflower sod is a carpet of young perennials grown in a thin substrate, offering a weed-free, easily transportable solution
The benefits of pre-growing sod in controlled conditions to reduce weed pressure and accelerate establishment
Controlling growth in the sod where it responds with explosive growth once installed in the ground
Meadow Lab’s method of growing sod on top of plastic outdoors for scalability and cost effectiveness
Scaling commercially and transitioning from hand trials to large production with new variables
How species selection for the sod mix has to account for rapid germination without cold stratification
Refining seed mixes that would germinate quickly and evolve over the years
The current mix includes a thoughtful selection of grasses such as little bluestem, fox sedge, plains oval sedge, and others
The mix consists of approximately 40% grasses and 60% forbs with extended bloom time across multiple seasons
The importance of site prep—especially for long-term success and low maintenance
Using solarization as an effective site prep method and starting months in advance to suppress weeds
How sod adapts to site conditions and microclimates, which allows for different species to dominate based on light, moisture, and soil
The importance of education with wildflower sod
The importance of evaluating the full cost of a landscape, including maintenance, input reduction, and ecological benefits
How Meadow Lab will eventually offer multiple planting solutions that reduce complexity and increase ecological performance
Sod size of 3 ft × 4 ft with 1 inch of substrate for simplicity and better handling
Ideal establishment conditions for wildflower sod
Being humbled by climate, weather, and growing conditions and how their mission is deeply tied to climate resilience and increasing the presence of ecologically functional landscapes
Advice for new entrepreneurs in horticulture to take advantage of “fresh eyes” early on before industry norms become invisible, drawing from prior professional experiences to create value, and reframing landscape design as a form of experience design, building on her retail background
Her regular practices of drawing and weekly handwritten to-do lists as part of her creative and professional process
Shares her favorite gardening book Planting in a Post-Wild World by Thomas Rainer and Claudia West and recommending The Art of the Start by Guy Kawasaki for new business founders
What is exciting Claire currently in her garden
How to propagate more gardeners by making the process easier and more intuitive and using messaging strategies like “Two-Thirds for the Birds” and promoting dense plantings over mulch
You can learn more about Claire at meadowlab.com and on Instagram at @meadowlab.