In 2019 I started my journey running a 1/4 acre market garden on the edge of London.. My dream was handed to me after documenting my journey on Instagram at my allotment. A local girl saw me collecting food waste from a friend's café that I was going to compost and introduced me to her grandma who had land. This conversation manifested into my dream. In return, I delivered weekly produce and maintained the land and made it look beautiful with flowers and vegetables. From that, I springboarded into action, using my knowledge and expertise to start a market garden from empty pasture into a fully functioning market garden, that supported locals with veg boxes and farmers markets along with supplying chefs at local cafes and restaurants. 

During my 4 years of learning and working with nature I saw an opportunity to inspire others and create community. This manifested in two ways. My first year on the farm was a big learning year and I got to know the land and space. By year 2 we were in lockdown due to Covid. This presented an opportunity to share my journey further online and I was determined to teach people how to grow food during an uncertain time and connect with their health. Once life went back to more normality I started opening up the farm for volunteer days and having people exposed to what working on a market garden is like. I saw an opportunity to teach, meet like-minded people, connect people with their food and cook for them to see the full circle of living off the land.

The knowledge I gained from this time was imperative to the next step of my journey, which to this day I look back on and see as a pivotal point of my path. Growing all types of diverse vegetables and seeing growth patterns, the wins, the losses, growing in all weathers and conditions and also experimenting in all styles of growing.

I also gained knowledge in how to run the farm as a business and how to deal with chefs, customers with quality control, quantities needed and people skills. I’ll always look back on those years at the farm with fondness and be thankful as it gave me the foundation for my future in this space.