Denmark: “Our urban farm helps shape the city and community”
Continuous Hen-of-the-wood (Grifola frondosa), pink oyster mushroom (Pleurotus Djamor), golden oyster mushroom (Pleurotus citrinopileatus), nameko (Pholiota namko), shiitake (Lentinula edodes), king oyster mushroom (Pleurotus eryngii), and common oyster mushroom (Pleurotus ostreatus) production is guaranteed.
By Rebekka Boekhout
Vertical Farm Daily
June 27, 2023
Excerpt:
It lies barely a kilometer from Noma, which Restaurant Magazine has chosen as the world’s best restaurant more than a few times. It is also less than 300m from Alchemist, a top-rated immersive dining experience venue.
As such, Bygaard, the urban herb and mushroom farm, is ideally located on the hip Refshaleøen island in Copenhagen, Denmark. Not so long ago, this area served as a shipyard, but now, as a creative hub, it attracts two million visitors a year. Bygaard supplies the Danish capital’s gastronomic scene with locally grown fresh produce. “We can cycle anywhere in Copenhagen in 15 minutes, tops,” begins Lasse Antoni Carlsen, the company’s CEO.
Community building
Three fundamental values motivated Lasse to start a project like Bygaard: community building, respect for the environment, and delivering quality. And all three are equally important. “With our urban farm, we don’t just market products; we help shape the city. We feel good in this environment, and customers love our proximity. And so, with this concept, we also want to be an example to others. The community only benefits from more local organic growing projects.”
Respect for the environment
And right there are the two words at the heart of Lasse’s production model of ‘respect for the environment’: local and organic. “We farm entirely organically, and in the future, we want to move towards biodynamic cultivation when we also develop our own substrate. Currently, that’s composted in a circular economic way, using it as a nutrient medium to grow special herbs. Mushrooms, our main product, is a good meat substitute and a valuable option to reduce the polluting impact of meat production,” he says.
