Our first post...Welcome! We thought we might start out with a bit of background information about who we are and what the Conservatory is all about.


The Detroit Heirloom Conservatory began in 2011 as a collaborative venture between Simeon Heyer, Amy Weiks and Gabriel Craig. As craftspeople by trade, Amy and Gabriel have always been interested in the self-sufficiency and empowerment offered by handwork, and in recent years this led to an interest in organic heirloom gardening. Of course craft is also the province of connoisseurship and, as practiced today, a certain amount of romantic preservationism. This interest developed into the fledgling project, Detroit Heirloom Conservatory. When Amy and Gabriel met Simeon Heyer in 2010, and realized there was a shared a passion for historical preservation, urban gardening and bio-diversity the project began to take on a life of its own.


In the 2011 Wayne County tax auction we bought a plot of land in North Corktown, just North of I-75 on Harrison St. Currently, we are developing a design for the garden in collaboration with local lanscape architect Erin Kelly. In our first year we plan to exclusively grow tomatoes, this being a manageable starting point from which to expand. Our goal is to create a dynamic space that serves both seasoned urban farmers and novice growers by providing resources to facilitate heirloom vegetable cultivation in the city and beyond. To that end the Detroit Heirloom Conservatory is service oriented garden centered around heirloom vegetable cultivation, preservation and seed dissemination. It is also our goal to be inviting to the immediate neighborhood community. Community gardens need to serve community to be effective and relavent. 


We hope to empower people through food production, while also promoting connoisseurship, which we see a natural outgrowth of the self-sufficiency that making and growing things provides. We believe an empowered self-sufficient urban farmer or gardener should have the freedom to cultivate whatever vegetables they choose. However, their choices are often dictated by commercial seed companies rather than personal preference. The Detroit Heirloom Conservatory seeks to facilitate an agricultural diversity that reflects the ethnic and cultural diversity of the city of Detroit. We also want to contribute to the resistance of mono-culture farming in a mono-industry city.

That is our premise. We are quite aware that we aim to serve a niche market, but with so many gardens and farms in the city we want to contribute to an already existing network and facilitate the amazing work of others. We are very open at this point in the project. We are taking volunteers and invite anyone who is interested to become involved. If you are interested please email gabriel.craig@gmail.com. 


Our immediate plans are to design and build the garden for the 2012 growing season. We have plans to conduct stakeholder analysis by surveying and canvasing other gardens and farms in the city to determine how we can shape our programming to fit their needs. If you are a garden/farm owner/worker please contact simeonheyer@gmail.com with your suggestions. 


Right now we are building our website and online presence, this website being a central component. We also have a facebook page which you can view here. We are working on a twitter feeds. There will be links in the sidebar shortly if there are not there already. We are working with acclaimed graphic designer Joshua Levi on our identity and branding, and hope to be a well designed venture in the not too distant future. 


We currently are considering how to construct and implement seed shares and memberships to the Conservatory as well as when, where and how to sell the tomatoes we grow. If you have thoughts or suggestions email us or comment below.


That's all for now. Check out these pictures of the garden site. It overlooks the Depot, The Bridge, and Downtown. 


More soon,
-The Detroit Heirloom Conservatory Team