Chris is an edible landscaper and urban agriculture advocate.
Having recently completed his Permaculture Design Certification, Chris is now working with homeowners, urban farms and communities in the South Bay Area to grow food locally through sustainable practices. With PorchSide Ecology he is helping homeowners bring their yards into full potential by designing, installing and maintaining edible landscapes. Dedicated to providing everyone access to fresh, healthy food, he is also currently working on the Farm Planning Committee of Veggielution , a hand-worked, volunteer-powered urban farm in South San Jose. He is also a frequent volunteer at Full Circle Farm in Sunnyvale.
If you would like to contact him, Chris can be reached at 650-464-7635 or by email at info “at” porchsideecology.com
Looking at the years ahead
Silicon Valley used to be known as the Valley of Heart’s Delight. It would be amazing if we all took part in bringing our suburban landscapes back to being a place of heart’s delight. Chris is working passionately to make that dream a reality. His vision is to develop a network of backyard urban ecosystems that provide rich, diverse and abundant food for the people of the city and beautiful habitat for native plants and wildlife. Looking beyond yards, there are so many underutilized or completely unused community spaces that could be transformed into places of rest, entertainment and restoration. Rather than being vulnerable to the fluctuations of the climate and the dangerous competition for fossil fuels, our cities could supply a significant amount of food and resources, if we only change our thinking and start acting in community to bring life, beauty and abundance back into our lives. It is his vision to make this possibility a reality so we can look forward to a future rich with potential and hope.
More about Chris
He has a Bachelor’s degree in English from UCSB and has completed the core studies in Computer Science at San Jose State. His pursuit of a Masters degree was interrupted as he began to research the developing global climate and resource crises that our world was (and is) facing. Two things had become very obvious: 1) growing food locally is tremendously beneficial on many levels, and 2) the art of growing food is challenging, deeply satisfying and very fun. For the last year he has been immersed in all things edible: tearing through a library of horticulture and biology books, studying Permaculture, edible landscapes and food forest design, experimenting in his own garden to turn his long time gardening hobby into an art form, working with urban farms and communities to support and enrich the local food movement. And he hasn’t completely abandoned the computer world. He still keeps his programming skills fresh by developing small web applications for urban food production, collaboration and organization.
In his spare time he works his backyard garden (“the Lab”), blogs, and tries to convince his border terrier that catching frisbees is fun.
Current goals
1) Grow PorchSide Ecology into a full time enterprise
2) Create Web applications and tools for food networking and exchange
3) Design and develop more hubs and links in the local food web
4) Get Grow Food Party Crews going in the South Bay!
5) Grow an impossible amount of food in the lab