Carousel House Farm
Farm Philly’s public farm in West Fairmount Park
Program Overview
Located on a half-acre of land at the Carousel House Recreation Center, the Farm currently grows up to 4,000 pounds of food (vegetables, fruit and herbs) per season, as well as flowers. The Farm is Philadelphia’s only public production and education farm, open to residents and growers across the City. Throughout the growing season, Farm Philly delivers educational opportunities, job training programs and peer-to-peer exchanges for youth and adults who want to learn hands-on farming, composting, harvesting and food production skills. The farm serves as a work and educational site for Farm Philly’s collaborative partner PowerCorps PHL. Over the years, the Farm has provided opportunities for residents to purchase vegetables, herbs and flowers through a Farm Share (i.e. or Community Supported Agriculture), while ensuring that food produced on public land is also directed to food access partners.
Program History
Carousel House Farm was founded in 2011 in partnership with the non-profit Federation of Neighborhood Centers (FNC), which runs educational programming and workforce development for youth in Philadelphia. In 2017 Parks & Recreation took over managing the site through the Farm Philly Program, and expanded the farm, programming and educational opportunities.
Volunteer at the Farm
Volunteer Days are every Tuesday from 5-7pm. Go to our events page to register and learn about other upcoming events.
Contact Farm farmphilly@phila.gov.
Diversified Vegetable Pre-Apprenticeship
Farm Philly partnered with Pasa Sustainable Agriculture in 2022 to become a training partner with the Diversified Vegetable Pre-Apprenticeship program. In coordination with PowerCorpsPHL, Farm Philly has been training young urban farmers since 2015. As part of the Pasa partnership, Farm Philly will expand on the workforce development efforts to train a diverse urban agriculture workforce. As a training partner, Farm Philly manages the pre-apprentice recruitment, training, and supervision, while Pasa offers the curriculum and administrative support. Farm Philly will strengthen diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice in agriculture through this partnership by creating a career pathway for agriculture.