Invite your friends to join the mission. Transform your own neighborhood by planting a community garden in your front yard. The Food is Free Project grows community and food, while helping gain independence from a broken agricultural system. The open-source project launched in January of 2012 as we lined our street in Austin, TX with front yard gardens. We have grown to become a worldwide communi
ty of people growing and sharing food in creative ways, learning from each other along the way. We have built gardens for free, using salvaged resources that would otherwise head to the landfill. Using low maintenance gardens such as wicking bed gardens reduces watering to every 2-4 weeks. This simple tool introduces people to a very easy method of growing organic food with very little work. A wide variety of fruits and vegetables along the block promote neighbors to interact and connect, strengthening our communities while empowering each other to grow food and share it. The Food is Free Project started with one front yard garden. The garden sparked conversations and a bigger vision of what was possible. Less than 3 months later, the majority of neighbors on our pilot block hosted front yard community gardens. We are documenting the process as we continue to expand, sharing our mistakes and successes, making the information open-source and available to anyone around the globe. Start a Food is Free Project in your town. It all starts with that first garden! More and more people are recognizing the importance of local food and supporting our communities. Food is Free provides a platform for community interaction that opens doors to further collaboration and connection. Imagine driving down your street, where the majority of homes host a front yard community garden, neighbors come together for potlucks, establish tool-sharing and community composting programs while creating safer, more beautiful neighborhoods. We are creating models for how to grow food in unused public spaces that provide opportunities for people to experience fresh, healthy, organic food, and the power of community when we come together for a cause that’s greater than ourselves. Onward and Upward,
