Personal Experience: How They Built a Farm and Now Supply Restaurants with Harvest

The owners of this home, Jade and Charlie, met in college. The couple bonded over their dream of a family and a cozy countryside house surrounded by gardens, vegetable patches, and spaces for domestic animals and livestock. A passion for farming runs in their blood—both spent childhood on farms.

Charlie and I met at university in Melbourne. Even then, we knew that the city wasn’t where we wanted to spend our lives.

But achieving their dream didn’t come easy. Due to Charlie’s work (he works as a visiting eco-consultant and collaborates with numerous organizations across the country), the young couple had to move frequently.

In three years of living in their new home, Jade, Charlie, their sons Harry and Bertie, and daughter Clementina transformed eight hectares of wild fruit orchards into a permaculture farm called Black Barn Farm and a homestead where the key factor is an eco-friendly approach. Today, the farm includes a garden, a sheep pen, and even an educational center where Charlie conducts workshops and consultations on permaculture farming.

The children are also involved in the work: Harry and Bertie manage their own mini-business, while Clementina is a regular customer.

Every time they moved, the couple had to reorganize their home again, so this time they planned to buy a fully ready cottage. But fate had other plans.

When the family first moved in, they had to live in tents: they literally set up camp on the farm, staying in tents. They immediately started renovations. It took six full weeks just to lay the utilities! But afterward, things went much faster: the kids painted all the walls themselves and replaced the floors. Then they set up the kitchen and other rooms.

The kitchen project was Jade’s idea. She divided it into two zones: one part housed appliances, work surfaces, and storage spaces, while the other served as a pantry where homemade jams, jellies, and preserved berries could be stored.

The interior of the kitchen is dominated by natural materials, mainly wood. The chairs, table, and storage shelves are made from natural timber. The couple also bought an old wooden table at a rural farmers' market.

The bedroom walls, like in the rest of the house, are painted white. This creates a good backdrop for various colored interior items and dark textiles. Large windows fill the bedroom with light and fresh air.

Once all necessary elements were completed in the house, the couple focused on the farm. Now it is starting to bear fruit. The orchard currently includes more than 1,000 different types of trees, including cherries and 78 apple varieties. The family also rented and saved a neighboring apple orchard that the owners had planned to cut down.

We plan that by 2021, our orchard will produce a harvest year-round: berries, cherries, early pears in December, and quinces and apples in April.

Today, the homestead includes geese, a pond with fish, domestic birds, and sheep. Just three years after moving in, the couple is already supplying farm products to local restaurants and small grocery stores.