There are specific issues the style trade will at all times love: The younger and exquisite. Artwork and cash. Nostalgia. A comeback. Every now and then, it additionally likes to throw itself behind a trigger.
By these metrics, Dan Colen is giving style so much to like proper now. A blue-chip artist represented by the mega-gallery Gagosian, he based a farm referred to as Sky Excessive that donates one hundred pc of its meals to native pantries in upstate New York. However 20 years in the past, Mr. Colen, now 44, was a important character in a forged of lovely damaged boys (nicknamed Warhol’s Kids) who turned the artwork world protagonists of New York Metropolis’s peak indie sleaze second — an period for which style is at the moment throbbing with longing.
Among the many notorious work from that point had been the “hamster nests” Mr. Colen created with Sprint Snow. (The 2 did copious quantities of medication, then rolled round bare in shredded telephone books.) Mr. Snow ejaculated on newspapers whereas Ryan McGinley photographed the entire scene, together with Mr. Colen’s oft-mentioned genitals. However that was then.
Now, along with the farm, Mr. Colen is the chief artistic officer of Sky Excessive Farm Universe, which sells merch and might be discovered on many style hounds who may additionally be seen carrying luxurious manufacturers.
The Sky Excessive Farm Universe brand encompasses a girlish strawberry sitting on a boyish crescent moon, which serves because the widespread thread throughout a bunch of Sky Excessive Farm Universe gadgets spanning hoodies, T-shirts, knits, socks, hats and underwear. Some items are traditional, like a denim chore jacket. A lot of the gathering is produced from deadstock or upcycled supplies. All of it’s normal streetwear fare, ranging in worth from $30 to $2,500 and offered at locations like Ssense, Nordstrom and Dover Road Market.
“It’s cute,” Olivia Kim, the senior vice chairman for artistic merchandising at Nordstrom, stated of the gathering. “It’s cool. However then there’s naturally the inquisitiveness of ‘Why is that this referred to as Sky Excessive Farm Universe?’ There’s the automated query of ‘What does this truly imply? Who’s behind this?’”
So What Is Sky Excessive Farm?
Positioned on a 40-acre property within the Hudson Valley in upstate New York, Sky Excessive is an earnest operation fueled by a mission of “meals sovereignty,” which principally boils right down to individuals rising and consuming recent, regionally produced meals, however which, in its founders’ telling, can also be a lofty imaginative and prescient tackling philanthropy, capitalism, local weather change, social justice and training.
“It’s actually a mannequin,” stated Mr. Colen, now sober and liable to sweeping philosophical solutions and large concepts. “We’re making an attempt to assist the following era of farmers who farm in the way in which that we accomplish that that everyone can eat the form of meals that we develop.”
Mr. Colen purchased the land on a quest to get out of New York Metropolis and, he stated, “commune with nature.” He was additionally on the lookout for more room to create artwork.
“I had no relationships in agriculture,” he stated. “It turned clear that if I used to be going to have an intimate relationship with this place, I used to be going to should domesticate it.”
First the Sky, Then the Universe
Sky Excessive Farm Universe is a separate LLC accounting for all of the clothes, equipment, meals, beverage and sweetness initiatives and collaborations. It operates like a conventional for-profit firm, besides {that a} portion of income are donated again to the farm. “Each buyer is a donor” is its tagline.
Mr. Colen and his crew provide you with the designs, whereas Dover Road Market Paris handles manufacturing, gross sales and distribution as a part of its model company.
Just like the strawberry to the moon, the style and artwork worlds have curled up tight on Sky Excessive’s lap. Since Sky Excessive Farm Universe’s inception in 2022, it has completed $5.5 million in gross sales and is now obtainable at 60 retailers. It has attracted a roster of in-crowd collaborators, together with Samira Nasr, the editor in chief of Harper’s Bazaar; Alastair McKimm, the stylist and former editor in chief of i-D; Mel Ottenberg, the editor in chief of Interview; the photographers Quil Lemons and previous pal Ryan McGinley; and Heidi Bivens, the costume designer for “Euphoria.”
Balenciaga, Bogs, Dickies and Denim Tears have partnered with SHFU. There’s additionally an ongoing collaboration with Converse that features Sky Excessive Chuck Taylors, in addition to with Nike and the artist KAWS. Final yr Sky Excessive launched its first beverage, a Honey Pop gluten-free, probiotic glowing water produced by FedUp Meals that was offered at Erewhon. This month, Sky Excessive ventures into magnificence with a hand cream in collaboration with the clear magnificence model and fellow farm proprietor Tata Harper.
In Might, the glamour flock will descend on Tivoli, N.Y., when Sky Excessive hosts its Spring Picnic fund-raiser for fairness within the meals system. The Roots are performing, and the host and advisory committees learn like a seating chart for the entrance row of a style present: Chioma Nnadi, the editor of British Vogue, Kate Younger, the celeb stylist, Derek Blasberg, Tommy Dorfman, Marc Jacobs, Kim Hastreiter, Chloë Sevigny, Laila Gohar and Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez of Proenza Schouler. The company sponsors for the occasion embrace Chanel, Champion, Gagosian, JanSport, Levi’s and Nike.
‘I see this as a sculpture.’
On a tour of Sky Excessive Farm’s grounds in late February, nothing was rising within the lifeless of winter. About one-and-a-half acres of the land are dedicated to vegetable manufacturing with one other 25 as pasture for cows, sheep and chickens.
Mr. Colen’s dwelling, the place he lives along with his companion, the bread artist, author and mannequin Lexie Smith, and their younger son, sits on the finish of a driveway close to a renovated barn that homes his artwork studio. Mr. Colen has by no means thought of himself something however an artist. He sees the farm as one in every of his sculptures.
If not a family title, Mr. Colen is without doubt one of the best-known and most profitable up to date artists of his era.
“We had been all functioning junkies,” stated Javier Peres, the founding father of Peres Tasks, the gallery that represented Mr. Colen from 2003 to round 2011. “However Dan’s concepts had been simply flowing. They had been grander than what he may do on his personal, however he had it in him.”
When Mr. Snow died of a heroin overdose at age 27 in 2009, the occasion was successfully over. Mr. Colen acquired sober and launched into life upstate. The marketplace for his artwork was flourishing, and he funded the nascent phases of Sky Excessive himself.
“The artwork world was like, cash was falling out of the sky in 2010 and 2015,” he stated.
The start of the farm was a blur. Mr. Colen referred to as a graphic designer named Jordan Rosenblum who had completed an internship at a farm. “Actually, he got here up right here, and we tried to make a farm, no matter meaning,” Mr. Colen stated. “We had some shovels.”
They didn’t get very far, however Mr. Rosenblum launched Mr. Colen to the idea of meals deserts, which means locations the place there isn’t a entry to recent, nutritious meals, like sure elements of the Bronx. Mr. Colen grew up simply throughout the Hudson River in Leonia, N.J.
“As any individual who likes to create issues, the concept I may create a instrument to serve this problem appeared actually fascinating to me,” Mr. Colen stated.
By means of his artwork studio he discovered an actual farmer, Joey Piecuch, a fellow recovering heroin addict, who moved to Sky Excessive and truly acquired to tilling the land and elevating livestock. Collectively he and Mr. Colen got here up with the farm’s title.
“It was a little bit of a joke,” Mr. Colen stated. “We had been two junkies who had been form of doing this very form, benevolent work.”
From the start, Mr. Colen didn’t need the farm to be a conventional enterprise. As an alternative of promoting its bounty, the farm would give all of it away. He enlisted his childhood good friend Joshua Bardfield, who labored extensively in public well being. They began working with the Meals Financial institution for New York Metropolis.
“There was no funds, there was no plan,” Mr. Colen stated. Nothing was papered.”
But the inkling for branding was there. Mr. Colen commissioned the illustrator Joana Avillez to provide you with a brand. She drew on the Disney icons which have been a recurring theme in Mr. Colen’s work.
“The farm could be very Walt Disney, having all these animals,” she stated. It’s idyllic.”
The strawberry moon was initially used for jams and vegetable salts that Mr. Colen bottled and gave as items. “Folks appreciated it,” he stated. “It was all do-it-yourself. The jars had been cute. It was like, What else can occur right here?
“Dan at all times had larger sights,” stated Melissa Bent, his first gallerist at Rivington Arms, the small however influential gallery then on the Decrease East Aspect. “He had a photograph of Picasso nailed to the highest of his work space at his grandfather’s junk store in Brooklyn. He needed all of it.”
Oh, to Be Like Patagonia
Sky Excessive Farm first acquired its 501c3 standing, making it a nonprofit exempt from federal taxes, in 2016, however it was largely dormant till 2019. Mr. Bardfield joined the farm full time and is now the co-executive director. Round that point, Mr. Colen approached James Gilchrist, an previous good friend from his Warhol’s Kids period, who’s now vice chairman of Dover Road Market USA and Comme des Garçons USA. They got here up with Sky Excessive’s first fund-raising challenge: an assortment of classic T-shirts and hoodies bearing Ms. Avillez’s brand and a collection of jams and honey that had been offered at Dover Road Market Los Angeles and New York. All the proceeds went again to the farm.
It did so nicely, Mr. Gilchrist determined to develop Sky Excessive as one in every of Dover Road’s manufacturers. “It’s been a loopy success,” he stated.
The place Mr. Colen goes, individuals comply with. “He’s at all times been somebody who has taken slightly bit extra initiative, a pacesetter throughout the group,” Mr. McGinley stated. “I bear in mind once we had been younger, he stated to me, ‘We must be actual artists, and we have to get a studio.’ I used to be simply form of content material residing in our little tiny house within the East Village.”
Certainly, numerous taking initiative goes on up at Sky Excessive Farm. Additionally, numerous speaking about initiatives. (They name it “dialoguing.”) Different buzzwords invoked repeatedly are “beneficence,” “fairness,” “capitalism” and “philanthropy.” Their north stars are firms like Newman’s Personal, which has donated greater than $600 million to charitable causes, and Patagonia, whose founder Yvon Chouinard transferred possession of the corporate to a specifically designed belief and nonprofit to make sure that the corporate’s income go to local weather change and environmental causes. Mr. Colen deems Patagonia “the good model on the planet.”
Pulling It Off
Between all of Sky Excessive Farm’s merchandise, collabs, huge program plans and fancy mates, it’s straightforward to neglect that its major mission is offering meals entry for individuals who don’t have it. In 2023, Sky Excessive Farm donated 19,306 kilos of greens and recent herbs, together with broccoli, lettuce, tomatoes and cilantro, 56,880 eggs, 6,408 kilos of rooster and 1,750 kilos of beef and lamb.
The bulk goes to hyperlocal companions, together with Candy Freedom Farm, Dutchess Outreach, Lengthy Desk Harvest, Willow Roots and North East Neighborhood Middle. “About 95 p.c of the meals we produce stays inside 15 to twenty miles of the farm,” Mr. Bardfield stated.
Lisa Zayas co-founded Willow Root, a meals pantry in Pine Plains, N.Y., 4 years in the past, serving about 20 households. Throughout Covid, that quantity jumped to 70 households.
“Sky Excessive was proper there, giving us produce, chickens, eggs,” Ms. Zayas stated. “Their chickens are lovely, enormous. They feed a household with leftovers, no downside.” She’s largely unaware of Mr. Colen’s profile exterior of Pine Plains. “I don’t know Dan because the artist,” she stated. “I’ve heard issues, however that doesn’t curiosity me.”
The pandemic introduced the urgency of meals shortage into sharp aid. “With Covid, individuals noticed their neighbors lining up at meals banks to get meals,” Mr. Bardfield stated. “The problems that we’ve been addressing for the final a few years had been on the forefront.” It was the catalyst for Sky Excessive’s enlargement, activating the 501c3, staffing up, increasing the model and elevating cash.
Sky Excessive Farm is within the means of shifting from the 40-acre plot in Pine Plains to a 560-acre unfold just a few miles away. There’s room for larger pastures, extra vegetable manufacturing, 40 acres for a farm enterprise incubator and numerous land. Plans for a way it is going to be used are TBD, however its founders hope they may contain climate-related analysis, together with habitat biodiversity, carbon sequestration, soil well being, water high quality and air high quality.
Sky Excessive runs a grant program that distributes funds to small regenerative farms with a deal with marginalized teams.
Schooling is an enormous focus. This fall, Sky Excessive Farm Universe is collaborating with Champion for a group of merchandise destined for the bookstores of universities with strong farming and agricultural applications.
Through the years, individuals have usually requested Mr. Colen how he has been in a position to pull this complete factor off.
“I made it utilizing my artwork mind,” he stated. “As an artist, actually, it’s arduous to really pursue this, however in concept, what I wish to make, no one would ever know was artwork.”
