The farm — and even more specifically, the soil — is where all the nutrition and flavour in our food comes from. Our Demeter plots in Kent and East Sussex allow us to supply our events and partners with a fresh flow of vegetables, fruits and herbs. At the farm, our dedicated team of biodynamic gardeners help us on our quest to cultivate biodiversity and challenge conventional food systems, making the link between the farm and the plate as explicit as possible.
The farm is our space to grow and discover. Through biodynamic land practices, deep ecology and deep listening, our farms become sites for the various levels of nature’s medicine: the medicine of fresh air, the medicine of birdsong, the medicine of medicinal herbs and fresh food, and the medicine of breaking bread with good friends.
Meet The Team
Dorothea
WILL
ANNADELIA
LOU
BASIL
ELLIOT
Biodynamic methods are all about restoring vital connections, and to achieve this we have to see the land we steward as a connected whole. That means everything from the insects, the birds, the plants, the soil, the compost heap, the water flows — everything is part of a single organism.
To fully connect with the dynamism of the earth’s natural energy and rhythms, we grow things with as little interference as possible. That begins with the soil, the most important part of biodynamic growing. We think of the soil as the diaphragm of the earth: the place where the energy exchange happens. When the soil is biodynamically prepared, it gives whatever we grow in it taste, colour and nutrients.
This is the key to the essence of the fruit, vegetables and herbs we grow: whatever is in the soil will be absorbed into them. So we need it to be abundantly good. Biodynamic eating is about making a conscious decision to connect to the earth: to make better decisions that will impact how we eat, how we feel, and the footprint we leave behind after we have done so.
Our head gardener Annadelia has this to say about the way we farm: “Biodynamic agriculture means being aware of the cyclical nature, rhythms, and connections between plants, minerals, insects, animals, humans and the cosmos. The ethics that motivate us to care for the entire system are at the heart of my biodynamic practice. When I'm in the garden, I feel halfway between a facilitator and a protector, more attentive to listening than to acting.”
What’s different about biodynamic farming? Today, some of the most common farming methods actually work against nature.
Biodynamic farming is a sustainable and holistic approach to agriculture that acts in respect for nature and its elements and in full harmony with its cycles from micro to macro, combining the concepts of healing and farming and connecting soil quality to human health.
Biodynamic means so much more than organic. If we analyse the word itself, we find two deeply connected elements: “bio” meaning life, and “dynamic” meaning force. In biodynamics, we therefore find a natural force of life.
Demeter is the strictest standard for organic agriculture worldwide. Demeter has been constantly evolving since 1928, making this the longest-practiced form of quality assurance in sustainable agriculture. It is also an international sign of quality, as biodynamic produce and products are certified to the same standards in more than 50 countries on 5 continents. With organic certification as a prerequisite (all Demeter products are dual certified and carry both labels), Demeter standards go above and beyond organic to guarantee methods of production and processing that are environmentally friendly, ethical and sustainable.
