Cresset Community Farm

Cresset Community Farm (CCF) is a biodynamic farm located beside the Big Thompson River six miles east of Loveland, Colorado. The non-profit Cresset Farm Development Initiative (CFDI) leases and stewards the land.  CFDI supports educational, cultural, therapeutic, and social activities centered in farm life through a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) operation, offering summer and winter shares of vegetables; a cowherd share program, providing access to fresh milk; fresh baked breads and pastured meat and eggs.  

Lawrence’s interest in seeds began in Germany at the age of 26.  He worked on a farm where they made homeopathic medicines, growing herbs in a biodynamic system.  Farming became his ambition and he completed an apprenticeship in biodynamic agriculture.  After working on several farms, he and two couples established a biodynamic farm in northeast Germany. 

Many of the biodynamic growers were coming to recognize that the open-pollinated varieties of seed they were most interested in were not being maintained and others were being dropped from seed catalog offerings in favor of hybrid varieties.  Many farmers began to select seeds for use on their own farms.  Lawrence and his co-workers operated an integrated farm and farm store with about 2% of their farm dedicated to seed production.  Lawrence worked intensively on leek seed while still in Germany. 

The rapid disappearance of varieties and the use of unwanted breeding techniques spurred the formation of an Initiative Circle in 1990 for developing and maintaining open-pollinated vegetable seeds for organic and bio-dynamic farming systems.  This initiative circle grew to include seed producers, a breeders association-- Kultursaat, and a seed company-- Bingenheimer AG. 

When Lawrence returned to the United States in 1996 he brought the seeds he had been working on with him.  His favorite seed crops include leeks, cabbage, beets and carrots.  What drives Lawrence’s involvement with seed and membership in FFSC is the very basic need for quality seed in our society—seed that can be passed on from generation to generation.  

Ursula and Lawrence are masters in simple life techniques and biodynamic farming. Creating and building a farm community on land that is secured for future generations is their dream.  They desire to create what they call a "soulscape"-- purchasing a portion of the land, building a farmstead with homes and outbuildings for several farm families, and an eco-village development adjacent to the farmstead.  Seed is an intergral part of that "soulscape".