This Hudson Valley Farm's Streetwear Collab Helps Underserved Communities

If you peep the merch for sale on Dover Street Market's website, you'll scroll past the new PLAY and BLACK collections from Comme des Garçons, the debut collaboration between JW Anderson and Moncler Genius, and more than a dozen new additions to Thom Browne's range of animal bags.

But earlier this month, some new gear was quietly added to the shop, and it's the latest installment in a year-long partnership between Dover Street Market and Sky High Farm. The limited-edition merch—which includes t-shirts, hoodies, totes, and beanies—has all been made especially for the Hudson Valley farm. Each of the dozen participating streetwear brands (which include Awake NY, Brain Dead, Fucking Awesome, and Supreme) have pledged to donate 100% of the proceeds from the sale of these pieces back to Sky High.

The farm, now a 501c3 nonprofit, has spent the past nine years tackling food insecurities in underserved communities in both New York City and New York state. Everything grown on the 40-acre organic farm—vegetables, beef, pork, poultry, and eggs—is given to local food banks and food pantries. As of this writing, it has grown and donated almost 87,000 pounds of fresh vegetables and almost 50,000 pounds of animal protein. 

"I got the property at a moment in my life when I felt a great need for wide-open space and distance from the city,” Sky High's founder, artist Dan Colen, told Modern Farmer. “I intended only to turn an old barn into a sculpture studio, which I did. [But] it started to feel wasteful to have all the land—like all it really was something to point at and say ‘that’s mine.'”

A friend schooled Colen on the prevalence of food deserts in New York's five boroughs and suggested that he could use that land for sustainable farming. He also gave Colen the idea to partner with food pantries so everything grown on the land could be distributed throughout the communities that would most benefit from it. 

Within two years, Sky High grew around 6,000 pounds of produce and 4,000 pounds of beef and, although its production capabilities have grown significantly, it's still trying to do more. The farm has launched a GoFundMe, and is trying to raise $500,000 to double the amount of land it can use, scale up its distribution efforts and to support other small farms in the region. ("By purchasing and distributing produce from a wide network of local farms we can increase our donation capacity and help sustain small-scale farmers at the same time," Sky High explains.)  

The charitable partnership with Dover Street Market is part of its fundraising efforts as well. The Sky High Farm x Dover Street Market Collection is available at DSM New York, DSM Los Angeles, on the DSM webshop, and on Sky High's own online Farmstand.