Project Mission: To apply and showcase the integration of fog collection into an agroecological system to exemplify self-sustaining agricultural and biotechnological systems while building research collaboration between existing land-based projects and educational institutions in the Bay Area.
Project Partner: Slide Ranch is the project site and partner. Slide Ranch is a 501(c)(3) and park partner of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area in Muir Woods on the Northern Coast of California above Muir Beach, a region noted for its foggy micro-climate.
Project Description: This project demonstrates fog collection as a site-specific and viable climate mitigation and adaptation tool, integrated into land-based practices in the Bay Area. By leveraging climate-forward and ecological design principles, the initiative seeks to address critical challenges posed by the California drought and enhance water allocation efforts. Specifically, the project explores opportunities for long-term fog and cloud harvesting as a viable practice for land and agricultural use as well as everyday users looking to integrate an additional water-source into their operation.
The core objective is to develop a framework for a microclimate fog harvesting system that can be applied to both small- and large-scale projects. Grounded in the principles of regenerative design, this initiative emphasizes site-specificity, alignment with local ecological systems, and the sustainable use of abundant natural resources unique to the Bay Area bio-region.
A Land Use Planning and Ecological Case Study at Slide Ranch: Site-Specific Integration of Fog Harvesting Technology in a Bay Area Landscape
Schoolyard Greening: Redesign for Elementary School Property in Occidental, California
My first design project, circa 2016. This redesign was in partnership with Occidental Arts & Ecology Center and a local elementary school in Northern California.
3LECHE Food Forest
Project Mission: To develop a contextual framework for traditional agroforestry systems and contemporary innovations in agroforestry in hemiboreal climates worldwide and specifically in Minnesota while simultaneously applying a technical environmental science lens to understand better the ecological components that support these systems’ functionality and resilience.
Project Partners: Marco Zappia and Kieran Foliard. In 2022, in collaboration with Adam Witherspoon, Dustin Nguyen, and Steven Befumo, Marco started 3LECHE, a distillation and fermentation company at FOOD BUILDING in Northeast Minneapolis. FOOD BUILDING, born in 2013, is an ecosystem of farmers, makers and purveyors in the Minnesotan food community, grounded and connected in the fundamental idea of using Minnesotan ingredients to make Minnesotan products. FOOD BUILDING is a collective space shared between Kieran’s Kitchen, 3LECHE, Alemar Cheese, Baker’s Field Flour and Bread, and Lowry Hill Provisions. It possesses a large side patio space, gated yard, and rooftop which is currently host to a set of beehives used by Skinny Jake’s Fat Honey, a Minneapolis-based urban honey company.
Project Description: Since the inception of 3LECHE, Marco and I had been in discussion around developing an agricultural dimension to the company in an attempt to create a small-scale closed loop agricultural and production system. Translating this discourse to application, our goal became building a small-scale agroforest garden system focusing on native plants in an attempt to create a biodiverse and intelligently designed food system. What is grown in the small-scale design agroforest adjacent to the Food Building’s property will feed directly into the production of liquors, distillation, tinctures, and ferments by 3LECHE and serve as one earnest example (of many) of what is possible here in the Midwest in terms of shifting focus back to our unique flora, food heritage, and land stewardship history.
