Plan – Willow Brook Farm & Art Center

Let's take a peak into the Willow Brook Farm crystal ball

There are lots of things that have been in the works here at Willow Brook Farm.

Phase I began with securing a farm property and making the housing habitable and land workable. Then we had to form the nonprofit and recruit a board of directors.

We’re in Phase II, (2-3 years), which initiated our first Beginning Farmer Fellowship program. We’re laying the groundwork for a successful farming operation, working on our permaculture design and planting perennial trees, shrubs and plants.

	Organizational	House & Barn Infrastructure	Farm	Art

Key	completed	in process	future

Phase I, 1-2 years	Aquire property	Rehabilitate farmhouse	Rehabilitate fields
	Establish 501(c)(3) status		Patch cut new growth forest
	Recruit board of directors

Phase II, 2-3 years	Design & launch Beginning Farmer Fellowship	Build an irrigation system	Expand our workable fields	Host artists for pilot residency
	Recruit first fellows	Build an apprentice apartment	Establish fencing
	Recruit second cohort of fellows after first growing season so we always have experienced fellows and new fellows learning from and contributing to each other	Build coops	Plant permaculture, including, but not limited to pears, peaches, cherries, hardy kiwi, and blueberries
	Provide affordable events to educate and engage the community about sustainable living	Rehabilitate our barn	Rehabilitate our apple trees
	Begin our community outreach and connecting with like minded people and organizations	Build greenhouse	Plant Garlic beds as part of WBF income stream
	Strategize and planting additional berries, trees for future income sources. We plan to self-fund our programs, to become less reliant on donations	Build compost system
	Develop permaculture design

Phase III, 3-6 years	Host monthly community events	Build an artist studio cabin and beginning our formal artist-in-residence program		Launch Artist Residency program
	Launch fundraising campaign to support building a commercial kitchen	Convert the summer kitchen into a commercial kitchen for use by beginning farmer fellows		Build a public sculpture garden
	Purchase a neighboring 7-acre piece of land to expand our gardens	Build hiking trails

Phase IV, 7+ years	What about a seasonal farm-to-table restaurant?	Establish the complete range of planned perennial crops to provide a stable income stream to support our fellowship program