The beloved Healdsburg farm adds blossoms, craft and connection to its farm experience

Flower Porch Creative Director Jaclyn Konczal

When Peter and Mimi Buckley purchased their 110-acre parcel along a secluded bend of the Russian River in Healdsburg 16 years ago, they had a dream: create an organic farm that was biodiverse, regenerative and would nourish people’s souls as much as it fed their bodies.

It took several years to enrich the soil, install irrigation and nudge the plants to thrive and the heritage-breed animals to multiply. It was a surprisingly successful learning curve for a couple who had no previous farming experience, coming instead from careers in fashion with Esprit Corp. and the founding of the nonprofit Center for Ecoliteracy and the David Brower Center environmental gallery in Berkeley.

By 2014, the operation was humming and by 2015 food production had doubled. Customers included restaurants, hotels, caterers and food lovers who didn’t blink at paying a premium for product like rare Cinta Senese pork, a white-belted pig of Siena, Italy. (Front Porch was the only ranch in America to commercially raise the creature prized for prosciutto.)

Ten years later, the property glitters, dazzling in rows, vines, bushes and orchards of pristine seasonal produce. Spring brings delights like multi-color beets, rainbow chard, cherries and bold-flavored Obsidian blackberries. Summer beckons with juicy heirloom tomatoes, tiny Fairy Tale eggplants and sweet-tart stone fruit. The bounty brims in harvest baskets year-round: Autumn’s Romanesco and Brazilian Piracicaba broccoli give way to winter’s persimmons and tender Japanese hakurei turnips, the crops overlapping under the whims of Mother Nature.

Yet the garden path hasn’t always been smooth. And now, the Front Porch team is taking a fresh look at their business model.

It’s become a whole community gathering, so people can make a day of it,”

Clockwise from top left: U-Pick blackberries, the farm stand, U-Pick heirloom tomatoes

“Our core remains essentially the same,” says the farm’s General Manager Tommy Otey. “We’re known all over for our top-quality produce. But the cut flower business
has grown significantly, and we’re building more on our farm
experience.”

THE MARKET and MOTHER NATURE

Some of the first trial products didn’t take hold, so some fields evolved to what grows best in the area. Then came the region’s seemingly endless wildfires, floods and drought.

“The farm had grown so much over the decade, but facing irrigation water curtailments in the Russian River, we had to scale down our operations significantly,” explains Otey, who’s been with the property for more than ten years. “We trucked in recycled water just to keep our perennials alive.”

Then the pandemic hit. Restaurants and hotels closed, and events shut down. On the bright side, Front Porch’s sales increased 50% at area farmers’ markets, as people embraced the outdoor lifestyle and bought more groceries since they were mostly staying at home.

“We saw a huge increase in retail flower sales,” Otey adds.

“With everyone stuck working from home, people started beautifying their homes with flowers. So after years of natural disaster and fluctuating markets, unpredictability and increasing labor and production costs in traditional agriculture, we decided we really needed something else to help buffer us.” says Otey.

FLOWER POWER

An answer was right in front of their eyes, literally in the ground, where they could actually trip over it. Flowers. The beautiful blooms they had been growing all along.

“Most of our business comes from florists in the greater Bay Area, with weekly deliveries of flowers,” Otey says. “And we sell incredible amounts of flowers at farmers’ markets.”

Generally, as a working farm, Front Porch has not been open to the public except for special events. But then a new audience took off, especially in Healdsburg.

“We didn’t know that this growing market existed until hotels were reopening after Covid, and many new resorts were being built in town,” Otey says. “Concierges suddenly started reaching out to us looking for clientele experiences other than wine tasting. People wanted to come out and see us.”

Front Porch was able to dig a long-wished-for reservoir pond, and expand the flower fields to six acres. They dreamed up a new brand—Flower Porch—and new programs to bring customers right to the source of the daffodils, poppies, daphnes and peonies.

Visitors tour the property, browsing among sprawling meadows of brilliant blooms in more than 300 varieties. It’s a natural expansion of the farm’s long-popular U-pick forays out into the fields to select personal choices of vegetables and fruit, except now guests can also stroll back to a newly built, modern glass and steel studio where they’re guided in creating their own floral arrangements.

“Being outdoors in beautiful nature and then into the studio experience invites you to slow down, and work with your hands,” says Flower Porch Creative Director Jaclyn Edds Konczal. “We encourage you to start with a cup of Mimi’s ginger tea, explore the grounds and picnic by the river.”

Guests also can enjoy new workshops like eco-printing using the natural dye properties of flowers and plants to create unique silk charmeuse scarves.

“It’s a chance to connect with people, with our own spirits and the earth,” Konczal says.

BACK ON THE FARM

Amenities are still evolving, as Otey recently persuaded one of his pastry baker friends to drop off artisanal nibbles to sell, another vendor to set up a gourmet coffee stands and yet another food truck owner to park for pizza. “It’s become a whole community gathering, so people can make a day of it,” he says.

More services are underway, such as increasing already available full service floral design for special events, hosting private gatherings at the salon and onsite or online ordering for seasonal bouquets, centerpieces, corsages, silk ribbon crowns, wreaths—essentially anything joyous that can be created with flowers, greenery, ornamental grasses, herbs and even fruit and vegetables.

“Healdsburg has become this massive tourist destination,” Otey says. “So we thought, ‘How do we participate in that more?’ One of our major assets has always been the beauty of the farm, so now we’re bringing the people here to enjoy it with us.”

2550 Rio Lindo Ave.
Healdsburg
707.433.8683
fpfarm.com/calendar

IN MEMORIAM

It is with heavy hearts that we share the passing of Peter Buckley, Front Porch Farm co-founder, at the end of April following a brief illness. Peter leaves behind a remarkable legacy rooted in stewardship, love, and generosity — reflected in the seasons of the farm, in Mimi and their children, and in the quiet beauty he so lovingly shaped around us.