Farmscape press release.

The world is litterally changing in front of us on many levels, economically and eco-conciously. A primary example of the new paridigm is the idea of "farmscaping". Imagine the services of a landscaper used instead for growing and tending a backyard garden. Personally I'm more for a personally tended garden, but for those who can't physically maintain their own gardens or those who simply don't have the time this is a viable alternative that gives you fresh food, involves eco-logical decision making, and puts farmers to work.

Anyhow, I thought the concept was pretty cool and thought I would share it here. Who knows, there may be an opporotunity for a farmer out there to start a similar business to this in the midwest or maybe there are some readers who could put a company like this to good use, I really enjoy what they are doing greatly

Rachael Bailin was kind enough to send along this press release and link to Farmscape. Thanks for informing us friend!


Farmscape Harvests Ten Thousand Pounds of Backyard Produce

LOS ANGELES January 24, 2011

Farmscape, a start-up farming venture in Los Angeles, has recorded its ten thousandth pound of unconventional urban harvest. The company tracks its harvest tally on its online yield tracker, an estimate for how much food it has grown on behalf of clients in their own backyards. Farmscape maintains the tally as a public record of their effort to change the way LA sources its food. Farmscape has been recording yield since it first began growing food for clients in Claremont, CA two years ago.

The company builds and then maintains intensive urban gardens for homeowners, producing impressive yields of fruits and vegetables for clients to prepare and eat fresh-picked out of their own yards. Their service lets participants enjoy the benefits of skilled homestead vegetable farming without requiring them to become expert gardeners. All it takes to join their service is some sunny square footage and access to irrigation.

For a large-scale farmer, ten thousand pounds might be a rounding error in a season's harvest. But for Farmscape, ten thousand pounds demonstrates the potential for a whole new method of food production for Los Angeles.

Farmscape's mission is to increase the accessibility of ecologically responsible homegrown produce in cities and suburbs. By offering to farm small-scale produce for city residents, Farmscape’s founders aim to remove food distribution from the food supply. Local food advocates often promote home produce cultivation for providing fresher and safer food than conventional production and distribution while costing less ultimate environmental impact. Farmscape founders find LA’s mild Mediterranean climate and expansive lot sizes uniquely attractive for such local food cultivation. They hope to demonstrate a sustainable silver lining in the city's often-disparaged urban sprawl: wide open spaces for intensive gardening.

"We're proposing a new, disaggregated model for farming that can accommodate the city grid," explained Jesse DuBois, co-founder of the business. "Long ago these Southern Californian valleys were all under plough. We want to bring farming back to these tracts of land that have been left fallow by residential development and the reign of traditional lawn culture."

The only reason freshly gardened vegetables are not the default for Los Angeles households is that city culture has traded away the time and knowledge required to garden. That's why DuBois and his partners started Farmscape, a pay-for-service to bring back the joy of local gardening. They want big participation. DuBois hopes hired urban farmers are one day as common as pool maintainers and "mow-and-blow" landscapers. He believes such a future would do wonders for the city’s diet.

“We want our clients to be free to enjoy wholesome, fresh-picked heirloom tomatoes, zucchini, cauliflower, and cantaloupe as casually as they can access fast food or processed snacks,” explained Sean Williams, another co-founder and weekly farmer for West LA.

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Contact: Rachel Bailin // (310) 694-8474 // rbailin@farmscapegardens.com // 2122 Hillhurst Ave Suite A, Los Angeles, CA 90027 // www.farmscapegardens.com