In Beausoleil

If it weren’t for the planning spreadsheet Timor opened up on his smartphone, it would be hard to know what decade it was whilst walking through the market garden and pastures of La Forge de Beausoleil. Since 2020, Timor, his son Cihan, his wife Émilie, her sister Marie, Marie’s husband Clément, and a handful of apprentices and volunteers have been transforming the once derelict farmhouse and land into a diverse family farming venture with methods both ancient and innovative.

Formerly working in the video game industry, the four left city lives for la vie paysanne. A life getting back to the land. Making the most of their love of animals and working out in the elements. Feeling and seeing each season moving slowly to the next.

Over 120 years old, the remote 17 hectare farm in the historical region of Périgord Vert is now home to cows, goats, donkeys, horses, hives, dogs, cats, chickens, and even a few chinchillas. Hens roam freely, bees zoom across the wild-flower filled fields and organically growing vegetables, horses gallop semi-wildly on their prairie. Evident during the hand-milking done twice-daily, each cow is known and loved individually, with its own personality, and even its own specific tasting milk.

Within just a few years, the family and the farm is growing and producing an abundance of quality food for local people, raising animals with respect and dignity, and all in a way that isn’t damaging the soil and biodiversity.