Bringing a Nature Focus into your Work - Resilient Communities Series
“Bringing a Nature Focus into your Work” is the first event in the 2025 Resilient Communities Series.
We’re joined by Evie Muir from Peaks of Colour, Nazia Sultana from Sustainably Muslim, Nicole Worrica from Wild in the City and Isabella McDonnell from Roots of Belonging. Sharing insights from their work and providing practical advice.
The 2025 Resilient Communities Series is run in partnership with YHA Outdoor Citizens and supported by Sport England.
About The Session
The session explores what it means to bring a nature focus in to your work. Looking at some language being used around nature - like nature connection, and nature recovery - and what that means. The session covers the benefits of bringing a nature focus into your work, as well as some of the challenges it might present. The session also includes lots of practical examples and insights from a panel of community groups who are working with a nature focus.
The Panel:
Evie Muir (she/they)
Evie is a nature writer and founder of Peaks of Colour - a Peak District based nature-for-healing community group, by and for people of colour. Advocating for the decolonisation of the outdoors, Evie is interested in the ways nature can forge a landscape of healing and justice outside of carceral feminist models. Evie published her debut book in 2024, Radical Rest, which is an exploration of Black and Abolitionist Feminist approaches to activist burn out.
Having worked in the Violence Against Women and Girls sector for over 10 years', specialising in Black and queer survivors' intersectional experiences of gendered and racialised trauma, Evie left when she became burnt out, disenfranchised and disillusioned. Her work now sits on the intersections of gendered, racial and land justice, and seeks to nurture survivors' joy, rest, hope and imagination as abolitionist praxis.
Isabella McDonnell (she/her)
Isabella is a dispute resolution practitioner, forest bathing facilitator and writer. As the founder and host of Xeno, she has conversations with people from all walks of life about their stories of home, identity and belonging.
Isabella founded the grassroots group Roots of Belonging, which hosts outdoor events for mixed, dual heritage, and multicultural POCs/global majority to deepen their belonging in the UK outdoors. She’s a recent graduate of the Opening Up The Outdoors changemakers programme and a member of the All the Elements Network.
Nazia Sultana
Nazia is the Founder and Director of Sustainably Muslim CIC, an organisation dedicated to empowering Muslims to protect the environment. They achieve this through a diverse array of events, workshops and volunteering opportunities. Inspired by the Islamic principles of stewardship and the life of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), Nazia motivates individuals to embrace their role in nurturing both the environment and their communities. She is dedicated to making the environmental sector more inclusive for Muslims and People of Colour.
Through her work, Nazia has supported over 1500 people and has successfully cultivated and maintained partnerships with charities, local councils, and community projects. She received the 2024 ‘Inspiring Muslim’ award by the Mayor of London and Greater London Authority for her work in the community and is part of Emerald Network's and The Aziz Foundation's 100 Inspiring Muslims.
Nicole Worrica (she/her)
Nicole is Head of Community Relationships at Wild in the City, a national, black-led organisation with a focus on health and supporting Black and minority ethnic communities in accessing nature and the countryside, addressing the widely acknowledged lack of representation and lower levels of involvement of people of colour in nature-based activity.
As head of Community Relationships Nicole cultivates strong connections with communities and organisations who support relationships with nature and who consider the barriers to engagement for people of colour. Her role promotes and delivers Wild In The City’s core programmes across London and the UK. Nicole is passionate about supporting the continuity of Wild In the City’s free Nature Connectors programme for POC communities who want to nurture their relationship with nature. Nicole co-facilitates on this programme which teaches woodland living skills, wildlife identification, traditional crafts and in-depth conversations reflecting on our relationships with nature as people of colour. She is enriched by the insights on themes around land, identity and belonging and the alliances and safety that develop when a group are taught by people who look like them.
If you enjoyed this session you might enjoy the other events in the 2025 Resilient Communities Series. We also have a playlist of videos from the 2023 Resilient Communities Series available on our YouTube.
