What does it take to grow lettuce, tomatoes, and apples at the edge of the world? At Las Torres Patagonia—where the wind can rip tents from the earth and snow arrives in summer—a small team is rewriting the rules of sustainable farming.
In the windswept shadows of Torres del Paine’s granite towers, at the very bottom of the world, you’ll find a quiet revolution unfolding in soil and compost. The Biointensive Garden at Las Torres Patagonia might not look like much from the outside—especially at the end of the growing season—but inside its greenhouses and compost piles, a small team is reshaping what sustainability means in one of the harshest, most remote corners of the planet.
It’s late autumn in Patagonia, and most of the garden’s outdoor crops have already been harvested or lost to the region’s sudden frosts. But tucked inside a series of humble greenhouses, leafy greens still flourish. Tomatoes cling to vines in their final days of ripening. Lettuce, kale, and even volunteer cherry tomatoes—plants that grew on their own from last season’s seeds—continue to thrive thanks to careful planning, clever design, and a bit of homemade cinnamon (they use the cinnamon as a natural cauterizer when they trim the plants).
Las Torres’ garden is more than just a source of produce; it’s a living laboratory for experimentation in organic, sustainable farming under extreme conditions. This season marked the first time in years that apples matured fully on the trees—thanks to a perfectly timed balance of sun and cold. The staff, visibly proud, described them as “the biggest we’ve ever had.”
The garden follows the principles of biointensive agriculture, a system designed to maximize yield in small spaces without synthetic inputs. In Patagonia, this is less a trend and more a necessity. The growing season is short, the weather is volatile, and supply lines to this remote region are long and expensive.
Here, soil health is sacred. Every bed is layered with rich compost made from kitchen scraps collected daily from across the property—everything from the hotel’s main kitchen to the nearby campsite and welcome center. Even spent coffee grounds and beer residue are put to use. Compost is flipped five times by hand over several weeks before being deemed ready to return to the soil.
The team rotates crops carefully, ensuring that nutrient-demanding plants like tomatoes and potatoes don’t deplete the soil two seasons in a row. Beds are closed for the season by layering raw compost and horse manure—when available—and sealing them under black plastic until spring. When manure is scarce, fallen leaves fill in.
One of the garden’s proudest features is its strict avoidance of chemical pesticides. Slugs, the garden’s most persistent threat, are managed with clever traps made from upside-down milk crates and dishes of beer. Slugs, it turns out, can’t resist the smell of fermentation. “Beer! The perfect trap! You might even find me in there,” I joked to my guide.
Flea beetles in the greenhouses are warded off with a slippery solution of potassium soap—a homemade concoction of recycled kitchen oil and potassium concentrate that’s sprayed onto plants. It doesn’t harm the vegetables but makes the leaves too slick for pests to cling to. For fertilizer, the garden brews its own compost tea, dandelion tea, and horse manure infusions.
Even the flowers aren’t just decorative. Roses and edible blooms are dehydrated for kitchen use and for crafting special welcome teas for guests.
In one greenhouse, eight varieties of tomatoes—many of them heirlooms—are winding down their season. From grape-like pear tomatoes to deep-purple Black Beauties, they are supported by vertical string trellises, which allow better airflow and more precise pruning. Instead of expensive treatments, the team dusts plant wounds with cinnamon powder, a natural antiseptic that helps prevent rot.
And then there are the “traveler’s tomatoes”—fascinating fruits that break apart naturally into snackable chunks. “It’s the perfect tomato for a backpack,” my guide noted. Here, practicality and curiosity go hand-in-hand.
The team is working toward a fully organic garden, harvesting seeds from this season’s peas and tomatoes to plant next year. While full organic certification isn’t possible—the use of wood-fired stoves disqualifies them—it’s clear that their practices are already exceeding many global standards for environmental care.
All this effort results in about 20% of the fresh produce used by the Las Torres kitchen coming directly from the garden. At peak season, that number can reach 30%. Considering the remoteness of the location—where even basic shipments require extraordinary logistics—that’s no small feat.
Only a handful of gardens exist this far south on Earth. Las Torres Biointensive Garden is among them, quietly pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in extreme agriculture. It’s a story not just about sustainability, but about creativity, care, and community. During the Patagonian winter, just two or three people remain behind to tend the soil, dry herbs, and plan for the next cycle.
Their work doesn’t make headlines, but it matters deeply—to the land, to the guests who taste the difference, and to the planet. And in a world where industrial agriculture dominates the narrative, this little garden at the end of the Earth is a powerful reminder that smaller can still be smarter.
Special thank you to Florencia Gray for the tour of her wonderful garden.
By Forrest Mallard.