A Nature-Bound Love Story

Awestruck visitors are referring to the sprawling fields of flowers, fruit and vegetables, recognizing a haven even without realizing that everything at Athiana Acres is thoughtfully planned to nourish the resident birds and bees while providing sustenance for visitors’ bodies, minds and souls.

Magical as it seems, Athiana Acres didn’t appear with the wave of a wand. It took four intensive years of Garfinkel and the Panatch family visioning, collaborating and preparing… in other words, intentionally cultivating this radiant environment.

Panatch’s family has deep roots in agriculture, reaching all the way back to their ancestral village in Punjab — and the farm that’s still in operation there. For generations the Panatchs have grown wheat, cotton, rice and more in Aittiana, India. When Panatch’s grandparents came to Canada with her father and his siblings in the 1970s, they initially worked in the Lower Mainland berry sector until transitioning into other industries. Despite this change of focus, Panatch notes that “my grandfather was passionate about continuing to farm in Canada.”

Decades later, when Panatch went to university, she enrolled in UBC’s Faculty of Land and Food Systems. Around the same time, the Panatch family purchased the Steveston land where Athiana Acres is now situated.

“While I was studying at university, it was always in the back of my mind and my family’s that we wanted to do something special in this corner of Richmond. We knew we had an opportunity to do something good for the community and for the land, especially being located in such a residential neighborhood. I imagined a community hub for food and farming, with a space for connection.”

That’s what she got — plus a whole lot more.

Even in her wildest dreams, Panatch didn’t anticipate hosting “the greatest local food celebration in Canada” — FarmFolk CityFolk’s annual Feast of Fields — or long table dinners for Michelin-award-winning restaurants such as Anh and Chi. The fact that these illustrious collaborations developed after just two years in operation is even more astounding.

Hosting research partners has been another welcome surprise. West Coast Seeds is trialing new varieties of kales and brassicas at Athiana Acres. Panatch has discussed the possibility of providing research sites on the farm with professors from her alma mater at UBC. She and Garfinkel are also interested in piloting agricultural literacy field trips that incorporate food sovereignty principles through the University of the Fraser Valley’s Food and Agriculture Institute.

Panatch could hardly have anticipated neighbours who walked past the farm daily until they felt so connected to the growing business they became customers, then friends. The magnitude of these ties has been continually surprising despite her hopes that such relationships would flourish — and despite her intimate understanding of neighbourhood pedestrian power.

The latter has had a massive impact on her life: during regular walks around the neighbourhood Panatch’s grandmother met another dedicated pedestrian, the proud mother of a budding physiotherapist. The two started walking — and inevitably talking — more often. It wasn’t long before the determined pair concluded that their respective granddaughter and son would be a perfect match.

In yet another happily ever after that’s really just the beginning, Panatch is marrying that son this autumn, in a flower-filled ceremony at Athiana Acres. She couldn’t be happier about it.

She’s also filled with joy at the results of many other partnerships Athiana Acres has cultivated. By collaborating with various businesses, she’s helped create community between food artisans who may never have crossed paths otherwise. That’s what happened when makers from La Glace Ice Cream and TEALEAVES joined forces to create Botanical Beet Ice Cream using farm fresh red beets and herbal tea designed to promote the colour of biodiversity.

“It’s the community building I love most. If the farm can serve as a beautiful place for connection through our markets, workshops and events while regenerating the land, then I feel like I’m making a positive impact.”

Garfinkel is making a positive impact too — and equally filled with joy, but from a different source: the soil. Oh, and rocking out to soundtracks from Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musicals while he’s driving the tractor, but that’s another story.

Garfinkel’s story doesn’t begin on a farm; he’s a city boy born and raised. Like Panatch, though, food and family are the starting place on his path to Athiana Acres. Some of his best childhood memories are of cooking with family, especially his grandparents. But the turning point was a humble potato.

It happened on his cousin’s porch. She was growing a container planter of potatoes there — all descended from one potato that had gone to seed in her pantry. “I think I immediately ran to the bookstore and bought three books on gardening,” Garfinkel jokes. “My mind was blown.”

From there, it was a whirlwind self-guided journey through food and farming, fueled by “insatiable curiosity.” Over the course of a single decade he ripped up his parent’s lawn to create his first farm garden, volunteered on various farms around the Lower Mainland, trained as a chef, then travelled overseas to complete a farm school program that taught him agricultural practices emphasizing permaculture techniques and showed him how to grow a lot of food using very little water. That wasn’t enough for Garfinkel though: next, he obtained formal certification in agriculture through Kwantlen Polytechnic University’s Farm Schools.

In 2015, Garfinkel became program manager and lead instructor of KPU’s flagging Richmond Farm School, where he nourished the land and the students until there was a six-year waitlist for applicants yearning to get into the annual 20-person cohort. Then, in 2020, he joined the team at Athiana Acres, where he’s now farm director.

Garfinkel was excited to be at Athiana Acres for two reasons: community and soil. Community had always been important to him, but its crucial role in agriculture became increasingly clear as he developed the KPU Richmond Farm School according to the new vision he’d helped to create for the program.

“Working community into that program became a priority,” he reflects. “I built community right into the Farm School with a requirement for current students to help the past students who’d transitioned into the incubator program through on farm volunteer hours. That ensured everyone was both learning and meeting people. I told them, ‘This is the beginning of your farming community. These relationships will last for decades.’ The mentoring, support, growing and learning together, showing incubator farmers there’s support they can count on… all of it creates a circular system.”

Nowadays Garfinkel creates circular systems and cultivates communities at Athiana Acres. It all starts with the soil, because everything in farming — and so, ultimately, everything in life — begins with soil.

Soil is a complex, diverse community comprised of both organic matter and living microbial biomass. Garfinkel started with the organic matter at Athiana Acres, planting and tending cover crops to help build up the soil. When he arrived, organic matter measured 0.8 per cent (8 per cent is a good round number to aim for). After only two years, and without bringing in or using any compost — just creating in-place, in the fields — it had increased to 2.9 per cent.

“It’s not a done deal,” he cautions. “You’re never finished building healthy soil. It’s the foundation of literally everything.” Garfinkel’s approach creates a circular system on the farm, with each cover crop folded back into the ground. This increases the soil’s biodiversity and ultimately its efficacy as a growing medium.

Other forms of diversity on the farm are equally exciting for Garfinkel. One of his greatest passions is crop planning, and at Athiana Acres the palette is broad — not only for the palate. Flowers are more than just another pretty face on this farm; they comprise a component of the business that’s as important as food.

Beyond diversifying revenue stream and making people happy, flowers also serve two more important purposes… especially with a range of floral varieties as broad as those offered at Athiana Acres. We’re talking Queeny Red Lime zinnias, Imperial Antique violas in shades of cream, peach, rose, burgundy, gold and white, Cupcake Blush cosmos and dozens more. In the biodiversity game, more is more.

Head Florist Kalen Meaden also appreciates the Athiana Acres approach to flowers. “It’s amazing to see every stage of growth, from seed to bloom to bouquet. Experiencing the science of growing flowers as well as the creative art of arranging them is really fulfilling."

Bloom times are staggered throughout the season so that winged friends on the farm enjoy a steady food supply. Flowers provide top-quality forage for the pollinators, which keeps their populations healthy so that they can keep crops thriving. 

These birds, bees and bugs also support organic certification by helping keep pests in check without chemicals.

The second purpose also relates to organic growing: by providing local, organic flowers, Athiana Acres offers options for avoiding the global floral trade. Despite the beauty of flowers from greenhouses around the world, the international floral industry isn’t known for being environmentally friendly.

But Vancouverites are, and Garfinkel’s experience in the restaurant industry means he knows that many Vancouver restaurateurs prioritize organic produce. It also ensures a strong understanding of the flowers front-of-house managers want to decorate with and the kinds of produce chefs want to cook with. Beyond the pros, Garfinkel and Panatch have also developed a range of offerings with appeal for home cooks. Their careful planning explains why Athiana Acres grows five varieties of cabbage, four varieties of beets among others.

That’s how goodies such as lemon cucumber, cone cabbage and dandelion leaves arrive on the shelves at Athiana Acres’ market. There, they glow with shades of green that “[reflect] beams of light; vividly bright and shining, glowing” — the definition of radiant, in other words.

Radiant also means “expressive of love, confidence or happiness” — all of which Simran and Garfinkel embody. And no wonder. Their shared vision provides the roots of this haven where resiliency, regeneration, strength and diversity thrive.

Is there a better way to sum it all up than the words uttered by a participant at a recent flower workshop?

“You know what? I think I actually do like nature after all.”

And that’s how cultivated radiance changes the world at Athiana Acres, one heaven-struck person at a time.

Athiana Acres
12800 No. 2 Rd., Richmond
athianaacres.com | @athianaacres