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There is the perfect property available for the full vision of Wellspring Living Arts, Inc. Please visit our slide show. It is the 146 acre property that was the former Lakeside School and the Edwin Gould Academy in Chestnut Ridge, New York
Along with the school and farm, we plan to start a conference center with an organic restaurant, cafe and a juried artisan’s gallery and shop. These businesses will provide substantial economic support for the school and farm activities. This property is not only beautiful, with a stream and a nature trail, but it has all the buildings and land that will be needed for our work. The location of this land is between a suburban and a small-urban community and would provide the bridge to both communities. This location ideally suits this vision.
As part of the planned financial support for the educational work at Wellspring Living Arts, we will have a conference center, restaurant and public gardens near the north entrance of the property. The conference center will also incorporate a retail store, café, and wholesale bakery. There will be space for large conferences and guest rooms for conference attendees. Contained within this space will be an amphitheater lecture hall, two smaller meeting rooms and 50 guest rooms. All conferences will be catered by the restaurant, including room service for the 50 attendee rooms, thereby keeping the majority of conference attendees on premises, thus saving them travel expenses and maximizing their exposure to our restaurant, café, and retail store.
The planned restaurant will have a multi-ethnic cuisine, focusing on organic, local, and heritage foods; to this end, we will use biodynamic produce and meats produced from the work at the Wellspring Farm. It is our hope that Wellspring Living Arts will be a self-sustaining entity; using produce from our own farm will drastically reduce the cost of shipped-in foods, helping to keep our costs low and maximize the return from the restaurant.
The restaurant will also benefit from a herb garden planted on the slope behind the restaurant and open to the public as a walking trail. The herbs from the garden will be used extensively in the restaurant and bakery, and sold, both fresh and dried, in our retail store. The café at Wellspring Living Arts will feature casual lunch and dinner fare as an alternative to our restaurant. We will serve soup, salads and sandwiches all made using the same organic principles as the restaurant, with as many locally grown organic ingredients as possible. The café will also sell baked goods from our bakery. The bakery at Wellspring Living Arts will be a wholesale organic bakery, using as many ingredients grown on premises as possible. Our baked goods will be sold to surrounding health food stores, schools and colleges. We will also use our baked goods in the restaurant and café, and sell them in our retail store.
Work in the restaurant, gardens, bakery and conference center will be an integral part of the pedagogy for our students. Along with other trade experiences, Wellspring Living Arts will utilize our restaurant, bakery and conference center facilities to offer training in culinary skills, baking and restaurant management.