On a chilly Saturday in January, a group of about 40 people gathered together with gardening tools, plants and one large pile of gloves in the Seattle neighborhood of Beacon Hill. Surrounded by a semi-circle of small wooden structures adorned with phrases like, “Fair Share For All” and “Care For The Earth,” the team of volunteers discussed the plan for the day. There was the sheet mulching, which involved laying down wood chips and burlap sacks to prep the land for planting, plus nursery renovating, composting and weeding.
The organizers made sure all of the volunteers, ranging in ages from toddlers to seniors, knew where they should go for each job and how to stay safe doing the work. They even led everyone in a short series of stretches to help them warm up. But before any of the work was actually started, Elise Evans, board president of the Food Forest Collective, which oversees this piece of land, made sure everyone knew that this was not just about the work.
“We’re all volunteers and it’s a work party and we can emphasize the party as well as the work,” she told the group.
This was the monthly work party for the Beacon Food Forest, a 1.75-acre maze of fruit trees, herbs, and vegetables attached to Jefferson Park that not only feeds the surrounding community, but also offers a brief nature-infused respite in the heart of this major metropolitan hub.
“[It’s] a beautiful green space in the middle of a neighborhood by a big road,” said Carla Penderock, community outreach coordinator for the forest. “[It] is really a place for people who want a breath of fresh air, who want nature in the city.”
The work party is a half-day affair in which a team of volunteers helps to maintain the diverse growth—a big job even in the off-season—and add to it. But recently, these events have involved starting “phase two” of the Beacon Food Forest, which means doubling the garden’s size.
Currently, the Beacon Food Forest consists of four key sections. There’s the P-Patch, which is a subscription program where residents are assigned a small rectangle of land and can plant and harvest at their leisure. There’s the vegetable garden or public harvest area, where volunteers plant a wide array of fruits, vegetables and herbs, and anyone in the community is welcome to take what they like. Penderock said this area has become something of a “walk-through food bank,” given how many people in the community it feeds.
Volunteers can meet for a quick debrief before getting to work at a gathering plaza at the top of the property. This is also the spot where landscape designers and horticulturalists occasionally offer workshops on topics like food forestry skills.
But perhaps the most breathtaking attraction is the food forest itself. The space is designed to be a self-sustaining ecosystem that mimics a natural forest. It has multiple layers of plants, from shrubs all the way up to trees.
“The trees and the other plants that are planted around each tree are chosen in a way that they uniquely benefit each other so that it eventually becomes a self-sustaining ecosystem, just like in nature,” said Penderock.
Although it hasn’t yet reached that self-sustaining goal (they still have to water it during the summer), she said it’s clear it’s moving in that direction.
The new section of the Beacon Food Forest will likely be similar to what has already been built, with dozens of more P-Patch plots, an addition to the food forest, and another vegetable garden.
The major expansion comes almost exactly a decade since the idea for the food forest was first conceived. It all started when founders Glenn Herlihy and Jacqueline Cramer were taking a permaculture class in Redmond. Their assignment was to design the ecologically and socially responsible development of a piece of land.
They picked this particular section of public city land in Beacon Hill, which, at the time, was little more than an empty piece of grass, and went about designing its complete revamp. The pair had no actual real-life development plans, but over the next few years people in the community started hearing about the idea and pushing for them to make it a reality.
By 2011, they were hosting community meetings so that everyone could have a say in the design. Soon the plan was approved by the city, and by the following year they were able to start planting.
Since the beginning, the forest has relied heavily on both community support and residents’ physical labor. Nearly every month, dozens of volunteers come out to contribute to the forest’s upkeep, and some of the especially dedicated one’s make it out even more frequently. And as a result, the community not only has access to a beautiful natural space, but a wide array of produce.
“Everything gets taken; we have nothing left at the end of the season,” said Penderock. “That’s exactly what we want.”