Green Barns Farmers Market
St. Michael's and All Angels Church, 611 St. Clair Avenue West
Saturdays, 2pm - 5pm
May 24th - late October, reopening year-round in the Wychwood Carbarns in November
One of the most exciting things about the recent spate of new farmers markets is how quickly they’ve caught on. The Green Barn Farmers Market was started last year at St Michael and All Angels Church at the corner of Wychwood and St. Clair Avenue West, and by the end of the planned market season, demand was so great that it was held over for an additional month.
“As part of building up community understanding of the Artscape Wychwood Carbarns Project, Friends of A New Park and The Taddlewood Creek Heritage Association built an outdoor bake oven at the 'barns,” explains market organizer Cookie Roscoe Handford. “A volunteer came out on summer Thursdays for 2 years to light the fire in it and to sell $1 balls of pizza dough. After 2 years there were about 250 people coming out every week. When it became apparent that the bake oven had to stop during construction phase of the park, talk began to spring up about having a farmers market in the area.
“The volunteer lighting the oven talked with the Stop, the organization animating the Green Barn portion of the Wychwood project, and it turned out they too had been dreaming of starting up a farmers market on the site. It was decided that the market would be The Stop's Green Barn Farmers Market. The Stop then talked with Debbie Field at FoodShare. FoodShare had been given some grant money from "Project For Public Spaces" and used it to help to foster 3 new markets in Toronto; Wychwood, Trinity Bellwoods, and Withrow. The result was last year's held over pilot market.”
The market itself is slated to move later in the year when the carbarns are completed, with the market closing at the end of October in the current location and then reopening - year-round - in November.
Averaging between 10 and 16 vendors, the Green Barns market includes many names we’re now familiar with in this column, such as Monforte Cheese, St. John’s Bakery, Chocosol, Ted Thorpe Organics and Plan B to name a few. Vendors were chosen using the criteria of local, sustainable and organic, in that order, and organizers encourage collaboration with neighbouring farms to cut down on the carbon footprint of the market. The market also has a goal of producing zero garbage.
Vendors here sell food items only, or at least products that are food-related. There is no jewellery or crafts other than a few things made by or from the farmers, such as fleece and wool from the Stoddart Family Organic Farm who are there selling lamb meat, or cosmetics sold by Bees Universe Honey whose primary product is, of course, honey.
The Green Barns Farmers Market offers an area for kids, as well as entertainment in the form of musicians, and a “Shop the Market” feature with local celebrity chefs.
Already, the market is a part of the Wychwood community where people look forward to their weekly visit with neighbours, farmers and community members. Once winter hits and most of the other markets shut down for the season, the Green Barns Farmers Market might just find itself to be a favourite destination for people from other parts of the city as well.
The Winter market is on now, running Saturdays from 9am to noon in the covered street barn at the Artscape Wychwood project. It's a great way to wake up on Saturdays!