Harmonia Farms turns Denver backyards into urban gardens

Christopher Lee kept looking around Denver neighborhoods and seeing the same thing: yards full of grass. To him, all that unused space raised a question.

“What if we just looked around and said, ‘Hey, there’s somebody next door that we’ve been living next to for six years, but I’ve never talked to them?’” said Lee, farm manager and co-founder of Harmonia Farms. “That’s really at the heart of what we’ve started with Harmonia: community.”

That idea became Harmonia Farms, a hyperlocal urban farm that turns backyards, vacant lots and other underused land into a connected network of regenerative market gardens. Instead of growing from one large field, Harmonia operates across small sites in Denver, Lakewood and Wheat Ridge, using neighborhood land to grow food for nearby residents, restaurants and community kitchens.

The project began during the pandemic, when Lee met co-founder Anu Rakti online. The two started talking about how to make a meaningful impact and eventually landed on a smaller, more local approach.

“Everybody in our society, I think, tries to go big in order to make a big impact,” Lee said. “That inverts the process by which we actually make change.”

Lee’s experience with home gardening led him toward farming, but the question of land quickly became a barrier. Buying or leasing farmland was expensive. Then he began noticing the land already sitting unused around him.

“I’m looking around, and everybody’s got all these grass yards,” Lee said. “There’s land right here. Nobody’s using it. And so we started thinking, ‘Well, what can we do here?’”

Lee and Rakti posted on Nextdoor asking whether neighbors would be willing to let them use yard space for growing food. The response surprised them. About 25 people expressed interest.

“Everybody’s so happy that we’re doing this because they’re like, this is exactly what we want people to be doing,” Rakti said. “But it’s that whole first step. Not everybody knows what to do, how to get it going.”

Harmonia Farms now has 16 growing sites and more than 25,000 square feet under cultivation, according to the farm. Together, those sites function as one distributed farm, with shared resources, crop planning and harvests that can go to Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) members, farmers markets, restaurants and community kitchens.

For Lee and Rakti, the model is partly about food access and partly about reconnecting people to land they already have.

“One of the things we want to re-engage a connection with is people in their own backyard,” Lee said.

The farm’s larger argument is that the modern food system has distanced people from what they eat. Most produce is grown far from where it is consumed, moved through long distribution chains and selected for shelf life, durability and profitability as much as flavor or nutrition.

“Produce in the grocery store comes from about 1,500 miles on average away from where you are,” Lee said. “What you’re paying for with that food is gas.”

Rakti said Harmonia Farms is trying to offer a different relationship with food, one based on seasonality, variety and proximity.

“The reason that we have cucumbers and tomatoes and the specific varieties of all of the different foods and vegetables has nothing to do with what we need,” Rakti said. “It’s all about what’s easiest for them to grow, what’s most convenient to monocrop. Shelf life, profitability. It’s not about our nutritional values.”

At Harmonia Farms, the founders say they are taking a different approach. The farm uses regenerative, non-synthetic growing methods and focuses on building soil health, conserving water and growing plants suited to Denver’s high-altitude, semi-arid climate.

Lee said the farm’s methods require paying attention to what each plant needs rather than forcing the same crop plan onto every site.

“You pump a billion tons of fertilizer into a plant, force it to do something it doesn’t want to do and force it to grow in a location it doesn’t want to grow,” Lee said. “Instead of dominating the plant, listen to it. What does this particular species want? Maybe it doesn’t want to be in this backyard. Maybe I need to grow something else.”

Because each site has different light, soil, water access and microclimates, no two Harmonia growing spaces look exactly the same. Some might hold tomatoes, tomatillos, peppers and eggplant. Others may be better suited to leafy greens, herbs or roots.

In its first seven months, Harmonia Farms has established growing sites around the metro area and completed early harvests. Lee said one recent harvest produced 18 baskets for members.

“The harvest went well,” Lee said. “We had one of our volunteers that we met at our farmers market who also became a member and then just really wanted to help out. So she came along with us, and we managed to get 18 really nice robust baskets for all of our members.”

The farm is preparing for its 2026 CSA season, where members buy a share of the harvest in advance and receive produce throughout the growing season. Residents can join the 2026 CSA by signing up through Harmonia Farms’ website.

Full CSA memberships are priced at $700 per year, mid-tier shares at $550 and foundational shares at $450, each offering bi-weekly deliveries of seasonal produce over 15 or more harvests. A limited number of memberships remain for 2026, and the farm is also building a waitlist as it expands. 

Harmonia Farms values the relationships it builds by delivering produce directly to customers’ homes.

“Everything is a relationship, community,” Lee said. “All those bits and pieces come to form that whole. That’s how you achieve success.”

Harmonia Farms also offers living microgreen trays, farmers market sales, restaurant partnerships and produce for community kitchens. Rakti said the long-term goal is not only to sell produce but also to create a system that helps people rethink what their neighborhoods can grow.

“It’s not just about us,” Rakti said. “This is not about us making money. This is about us establishing these values and creating these systems for everybody. We want to share.”