Today we’d like to introduce you to Vanessa Bailey.
Hi Vanessa, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
In 2012, I was working as a Social Worker for the state of Texas and frustrated by the daily limitations my clients faced when forced to chose between affording food and affording medicine.
I knew that there had to be a better way to close gaps between our healthcare systems and community support networks, and began dreaming of ways to achieve more food freedom for those in my care.
Feeling called to help folks start gardening, I again met the limitation that many did not have access to the space to grow. One Sunday, I approached my church Pastor and pled my case- we should stop paying to grow grass, and we should start teaching people how to grow gardens. With the support of that church community, I formed my town’s first community garden, Common Ground Community Garden of Flower Mound.
We based our model on workshops teaching volunteers how to garden in the church backyard, and everything that we grew we donated to local food banks through the North Texas Food Bank Partner Garden Program.
We amassed a tremendous volunteer base and grew over 5,000 lbs. of food in a church backyard. We weren’t just growing gardens; we were growing gardeners.
When my little church outgrew their building and needed to move, Common Ground lost our access to land. Suddenly my personal inbox was flooded with folks asking when I could host more classes or if I could teach them in their own backyards. I started my garden coaching and consulting business, Farmgirl Gardens & Market to meet this need.
While garden coaching was meeting the needs for those with resources to grow food, my heart for helping heal a broken social food web still yearned to make a difference. I was a Food Fighter, and the frontlines were calling me.
I answered that call by accepting the Garden Coordinator role for the North Texas Food Bank. The success of Common Ground had not gone unnoticed, and the NTFB hired me to bring their flagship teaching garden to life. During my time working directly for the largest food bank in Texas I was afforded the ability to create my own waste streaming systems and community networks to help close agricultural food gaps. I became a certified Permaculture Designer and Master Composter and continued advancing the call for public gardens.
When my family needed me back at home, I knew I’d have to find a way to keep my nonprofit passions alive and I formed Farmgirl Gives in 2020 to train and equip the next generation of urban farmers.
Now through my business and nonprofit- I have the great pleasure to teach others about food insecurity, how to become more self-reliant by growing food, and the importance of bringing the farm-to-table experience to our youth through mobile AgriSTEAM education.
We do a little bit of everything- from volunteering at our partner farms, bringing hatching eggs to classrooms, and installing school gardens.
My consulting business is still growing, and now I get to work on projects across DFW. I’ve designed a massive culinary garden for a vineyard in Florence, thriving outdoor classrooms for several local Montessori schools, and have even helped an off-grid community develop a four-season homestead garden.
I love that my journey began organically- observing problems and finding sustainable solutions. Permaculture helps fill in the gaps between the desire to grow and the resources to scale. Becoming self-reliant in food shouldn’t be a skill afforded to only those with large estates. Access to food is a human right.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
One of the largest challenges is breaking down the perceived barriers to growing food. No land? No problem. Everyone has to start somewhere. Whether that’s regrowing green onions on a windowsill, growing salad greens on a patio, or making a homestead garden on a postage stamp backyard- everybody can grow something.
Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Farmgirl Gardens & Market?
Farmgirl Gardens & Marker is a one-woman-run- full-scale culinary garden design firm. As a Certified Permaculture Designer and Master Composter with over 20 years of growing gardens in Texas under my belt, I help create thriving, organically sustained food gardens across DFW.
I’m most known for my ability to break down high-level concepts into working knowledge. While I have a background in biochemistry, growing food doesn’t require a degree. I’m a bit of a rebel amongst some of the garden guru hierarchy. I’m not here to tell you that you can only grow food if you can afford to build from organically sourced cedar plank-raised beds or that you need drip irrigation to be successful. The mark of success in the seed-to-table journey is more nuisanced than that- there will always be good, better, and best practices, but if people teach that you can’t start to grow until you can afford to, you never will.
Risk-taking is a topic that people have widely differing views on – we’d love to hear your thoughts.
I tell my trigger-shy clients all the time not to worry about messing things up. As a Master Composter, I have the utmost appreciation for the power of decay. It’s a garden! What’s the worst that can happen if you kill a plant? We are either growing food, or we are building compost. Either way, we win!
Pricing:
- Permaculture Consulting $150 per hr, and concept-specific bundles are available.
Contact Info:
- Website: Farmgirlgardensandmar
ket.com - Instagram: https://instagram.
com/farmgirl_garden_coach? igshid=OGQ5ZDc2ODk2ZA%3D%3D& utm_source=qr - Facebook: https://www.
facebook.com/farmgirlgarden? mibextid=LQQJ4d - Linkedin: https://www.
linkedin.com/in/vanessa- bailey-76297339?trk=people- guest_people_search-card - Youtube: https://youtube.com/@
FarmgirlGardensMarket?si= TwQkLcIL3Ip468lK - Other: https://www.facebook.
com/growgrit?mibextid=LQQJ4d
