This article is part of FT Globetrotter’s Guide to London
The city’s farms are over 50 years old. These unique pockets of urban agriculture, where city residents are given the opportunity to spend time outside, meet animals and learn where their food came from, were first born in the UK in the 1970s. Over time, their remittances became more ambitious. The farm store was established to sell food and flowers. Partnerships with schools and businesses were formed for further education and volunteer work. And the animal stock was expanded from pigs and sheep to llamas and rheas.
What began as a way to transform abandoned land and involve local residents in animal maintenance and agriculture has evolved over time. Recently, dozens of urban farms in London, constrained by the environment with footprints, have become experimental, environmentally friendly agricultural testbeds.
“These green oasis meet some of the toughest challenges faced in modern cities, including food inequality, limited access to fresh food, and poor health,” says Leon Ballin, Program Manager for Sustainable Food Places at the Soil Association. He points to City Farm’s involvement in initiatives such as the Sustainable Food Partnership Program, which aims to tackle issues such as food poverty, safety and climate change, and aims to create wildlife corridors to compensate for other lost habitats in sprawl.
In Hodenden, located in Greenwich’s Ealing and Citopia’s Autonomous Borough, farmers follow a “no-diagnosis” approach with planting. When planting or weeding, it leads to improved soil health, drainage and the presence of microorganisms. Meanwhile, the Wood Arks of Rickmansworth recently split one of its fields into six segments to try different approaches on a small scale.
However, these changes in priorities do not mean that urban farms are closing doors to visitors and volunteers. “What remains constant is providing local people with connections to animals and gardens,” says Pamela Park, CEO of the UK’s first variety of Kentish Town City Farm, when it first opened in 1972.
City Farms are increasingly seeking help from businesses. Almost every London location welcomes corporate volunteers to support maintenance and conservation efforts. Sitopia welcomed groups of O2 Arena and environmental, food and rural groups, with Barclays, Gucci and Warner Bros all visiting Horse Enden. So, whether you want to get your hands dirty, learn about experimental agriculture, or visit shops where produce is actually grown on the premises, there are four of the busiest and most interesting urban farms in London.
Hodenden
Horace Den Lane North, London UB6 7pq
It’s hard to think about what they don’t do in Hodenden. Among the tasks left to around 30 regular volunteers at community farms in northwest London are vegetable and flower cultivation, composting, orchard care, animal care, sales, conservation programmes, habitat restoration, hedge planting and scthing.
“The main priority is essentially correct,” says Councillor Justin Bonnet, who has been supporting since 2020. “But people can benefit themselves.” The afternoons are outside winter and growing seasons, but there are nests of activity in the fields and gardens surrounding the Victorian farmhouses on the southeast corner of Hodenden Hill. Volunteers at MindFood, a mental health charity that shares the space, are handling the raised beds. The hop plants are cleaned up. The rugs are clustered in one of the outbuildings. Nettles are dried on cows to make hay. And two new kittens are taking on new roles as rat catchers.
Most working farms, including animals, are accessible only by volunteers (anyone can sign up for sessions on Mondays, Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays. Other than that, there are still plenty of visits. In the summer, a store selling seasonal produce. The taproom at Perivale Brewery is on the grounds, and like Bakery The Horsenden Loaf, its wood oven uses pizza and bread using kindling from the farm site. Oh, and Hordenden Hill itself on 250 acres of ancient forests, meadows and walking trails. Website; Directions
Stepney City Farm
Stepneyway, London E1 3dg
Dotting this 4.5-acre site reminds us of many faces in the East End. The brick facade of the chapel, everything else left of the 19th century Baptist College. Tumbledown walls running along one of the growing fields – the last remnants of an old trade integration hall that was bombed during World War II. More recently, it is located next to the site, a more modern access shaft on the Crossrail line. Somewhere beneath Butapen, the branches of the north and south of the railway meet.
The development helped fund a new barn and building on the working farm, first opened by local residents to take advantage of the farm complex that was bombed in 1979. Corporate volunteering and team building account for much of its revenue. The farm is plagued by 4,000 visitors from city banks, startups and law firms in the past year alone, as the farm is free to visitors. “There is never an admission fee,” says CEO Claire Hawkins.
It is a work farm that avoids pesticides, chemicals and heavy machinery where meat and produce are sold weekly at local restaurants and at markets on Saturdays. It also has three studios (now houses ceramicists, woodworkers and mixed media artists), indoor and outdoor classrooms, and a new cafe. “The farm is a place where everyone has something,” Hawkins says. “If there’s something you haven’t done, you’re going to ask people about it.” Website; Directions
Citopia Farm
331 Shooters Hill, London DA16 3RP
Just two acres of fields in southeast London grow an astounding variety of food and flowers, including rockets, chards, spinach, red kale, vibrant choys, komatsuna, asparagus, artichokes, broccoli and broccoli. In the summer, there are 25 types of heritage tomatoes. It goes without saying that it is apples, pears, pine and cherry trees. But what’s important is, there are no potatoes. Instead, the focus is on “cut and come back” plants that can be partially harvested and then left behind. This is a food that can be sold with minimal processing.
This variety will be delivered to Citopia Farm Vegetable Box and Flower Subscriptions (from £10.95 per week). “We want to help create healthier, equitable and sustainable food systems,” says founder Chloë Dunnett, who tours the PolyTunnel, greenhouses and bed arrays (the site is leased from a much larger woodland farm in Shooters Hill). This means volume diversity, year-round growth, pesticide-free, and a no-disability approach. “We help maintain the structure of the soil if we’re not intrusting it,” says Dunnett. It points out that one teaspoon of soil contains more microorganisms than humans on Earth.
Citopia also deals with cut flowers. It addresses 90% of flowers imported rather than grown in the UK, partly to encourage biodiversity and beauty. The farm is a nonprofit community profit company, volunteers came once a week, schools and business groups were welcomed, and March saw a return of organic growth courses. The scale is relatively small for now, but Dunnett is planning a crowdfunder for Eco-Barn to accommodate the right facilities. “We can’t feed London,” she says. Website; Directions
Wood Arks Farm
Denham Way, Maple Cross, Rickmansworth WD3 9xq
Three years ago, when Rose Lewis arrived at Wooddork Farm near Rickmansworth, outside London, the land had decades of intensive, mechanized, chemically significant agricultural scars. After a century of ownership by the Findlay family, the farm was awarded to the Soil Association Land Trust in 2020 with the goal of transforming it into a fully organic, community-driven, sustainable site.
“We went on a journey to change the land,” says Lewis, the farm’s program director who oversaw the progressive regeneration of the 300-acre site. This means crop rotations, hedge repotting (we are aiming to plant 2km so far, up to 5km), creating market gardens and wildlife corridors, sampling soil, and the weekly compost club that donates its production to community gardens. Wood Ark, bordered by the M25 Expressway on the outskirts of London, is less space-restricted than other urban farms, but its focus on education and community promotes the atmosphere of the small site.
In the transformation of Woodoaks, the chief was the renovation of the Blackburn in the 16th century. This is a Grade II registered wood post and truss building, once used as a threshing barn, but is now envisioned as an event space and community hub. The two adjacent cart sheds have volunteer and education centres for families, retirees, schools and business groups who help plant, composting and conservation. “All farms should be involved in the community,” Lewis says. “All farms should be in care of nature.” Website; Directions
Do you have your favorite urban farm in London or do you have your own city? Please let me know in the comments below. Follow FT Globetrotter on Instagram at @ftglobetrotter
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