Picardo Farm

Picardo Farm is a convert|98000|sqft|m2|abbr=on. parcel of property in Wedgwood, Seattle, Washington, consisting largely of 281 plots used for gardening allotments. [http://www.seattle.gov/neighborhoods/ppatch/locations/5.htm Picardo Farm] , P-Patch Community Gardens, City of Seattle Department of Neighborhoods web site. Accessed online 28 October 2006.] It is the original P-Patch (the local term for such community gardens): the "P" originally stood for "Picardo", after the family who owned it.Kery Murakami, [http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/222189_vsecondary29.html Do you know why they're called P-patches?] , "Seattle Post-Intelligencer", April 29, 2005. Accessed online 28 October 2006.] The Picardos' land went beyond the present P-Patch; it also encompassed the property of the adjacent Reform Jewish Temple Beth Am and of University Prep, an independent private co-educational, non-sectarian day school for grades six through twelve.Fact|date=February 2007

The Picardo family farmed 20 acres at 25th Avenue Northeast and Northeast 80th Street from the 1920s to about 1962 or '63. Architect Victor Steinbrueck, writing in 1962, called it "an unusual reminder of the past" and praised its old barn (now demolished) as "a simple example of the anonymous architecture that has always been part of the local scene." [Victor Steinbrueck, "Seattle Cityscape", University of Washington Press, Seattle, 1962, p.141] Rainie Picardo leased out plots for a few more years, and then the city bought the land.

It is one of two historical farms preserved within Seattle city limits, the other being Marra Farm in South Park. [Athima Chansanchai, [http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/226993_marra03.html?searchpagefrom=2&searchdiff=3 Marra Farm plants seeds for South Park community] , "Seattle Post-Intelligencer", June 3, 2005. Accessed online 28 October 2006.] The city's official web site describes Picardo Farm as having "Seattle's best soil… Rich, black, peaty, sucking with moisture in the spring, powdery dry for digging potatoes…

The soil isn't the only thing that has put Picardo Farm on the
bronze statue known as the Picardo Venus: "Pregnant, naked, hair in dreadlocks and sporting a sparkling nose stud".Tim Klass (Associated Press), [http://www.lmtonline.com/news/archive/1021/pagea7.pdf Garden community aflame over Venus] , "Laredo Morning Times" (Laredo, Texas), October 21, 1999, p. 7A. Accessed online 28 October 2006.] [Steve Anderson, [http://web.archive.org/web/20001209130800/http://www.speakeasy.org/~docschlk/statue.htm The Picardo Venus] , originally on the personal web site of Larry Nielson, Picardo Farm P-Patch Art Committee Chair; archived Dec 9, 2000 on the Internet Archive.] Sitting next to a children's play area, the statue was originally quite controversial. One P-Patch gardener remarked of it, "She’s glorifying fertility a little too much for kids, isn’t she?" Nonetheless, a January 2000 poll of the Picardo gardeners resulted in a decision to keep the statue. [Larry Nielson, [http://web.archive.org/web/20001017232153/www.speakeasy.org/~docschlk/controv.htm The Picardo Venus Controversy] , originally on the personal web site of Larry Nielson, Picardo Farm P-Patch Art Committee Chair; archived Dec 9, 2000 on the Internet Archive.]

Notes

External links

* [http://www.seattle.gov/neighborhoods/ppatch/locations/5.htm Official site] , as part of the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods
* [http://gogoweb.com/anderson/ Sculptor Steve Anderson's web site]