Sharon Prince & Grace Farms

Photography by Andrew Werner 

It’s been ten years since Sharon Prince established Grace Farms on an 80 acre property in the Northwest corner of New Canaan… and ten years later Grace Farms has proven itself to be a revolutionary cultural institution providing unique benefits to its surrounding communities and innovative solutions for the world.

Sharon Prince’s dad was an Electrical Engineer who had to move the family around a lot to accommodate his job, so Sharon grew up in ten different States and attended more than a dozen different schools before graduating from high school. “My mom, who came from a family with five generations of pediatricians, instilled the ethos in her four children, that you must ‘bloom where you are planted’,” Sharon recalls. “I put myself through college and earned an MBA at the University of Tulsa, where I worked as a Graduate Assistant with Dr. Robert Hisrich in the new Entrepreneurial Studies Department, which was transformational for me.”

“The other transformative thing about the University of Tulsa, for me, was that I met Bob there,” Sharon says, with a big smile, about her husband, Bob Prince. “We’d both landed jobs at Bridgewater, so we moved to Ridgefield. Later I become the North American President of 66° North, an Icelandic outerwear gear company that I’d discovered on a trip to Iceland. Bob stayed with Bridgewater and is now the Co-Chief Investment Officer.”

“At 36, I had a major health scare and kind of defied all odds coming out okay after a brain surgery…and, after facing mortality, I’ve appreciated every day since. …And, even as a young girl - and maybe because we moved around so much - I’ve always been very aware of inequity, and particularly in education. …I abhor injustice in all its forms and feel wired to do as much as I can to advance good in the world.”

“Three children and years later, we moved from Ridgefield to New Canaan” Sharon chronicles. “When we first set out to build Grace Farms, I went to the Town and asked them what New Canaan needed most to adequately serve the community... and they told me New Canaan needed a performing arts center, fields, courts, and open outdoor spaces. So we set out to combine all of those things into one place that could also function as the platform for Grace Farms Foundation.”

“I’m so committed to what we’re doing and what we’ve accomplished here in our first ten years at Grace Farms… that I thought now might be a good time to share how we’ve turned an aspirational vision into a reality.”

“I wanted to build a hopeful place,” Sharon recounts. “I envisioned Grace Farms not just as a destination, but as a catalyst to advance good in the world, a place rooted in beauty, nature, and architecture. The 80 acre property was slated to become a residential subdivision, but I was committed to preserving the land and creating open space where beauty, community, and purpose could converge. A place that would have far-reaching impact.”

“I believe that architecture can be a driver of new outcomes,” Sharon reflects. “We’re in a town that was the hotbed of midcentury modern architecture - and that provided context for the design. I believe that space communicates. What can space do? Can you embed values into space? Can it be generative? …Even more important, we wanted the building to be intertwined with the landscape - both blending in, and still making a statement. …But it really wasn’t until we brought the award-winning architectural firm SANAA on board that the vision became what Grace Farms is today,” Sharon shares.

The sinuous River Building snakes down a slope on the property, and serves to connect the property’s five glass volumes like organs of a working body. It stands in absolute harmony with the surrounding hills and meadows. Sharon personally oversaw the entire project, and was known for regularly walking the roof of the building in a hardhat during the construction phase.

The Sanctuary is an indoor amphitheater with seating for 700, perfectly engineered acoustics, and a giant glass wall offering an eastern-facing panoramic view of the property’s open fields as backdrop to the performance stage.

Sharon’s daughter, Chelsea Thatcher, who is the Founding Creative Director and Chief Strategic Officer at Grace Farms, has established a regular offering of world-renowned musical performances at the Sanctuary, including the pivotal achievement of hosting the London Philharmonic Orchestra in 2024. And Grace Farms will host Yo-Yo Ma in 2026.

The Library houses a carefully curated collection of books that speak to the organization’s key initiatives: nature, arts, justice, community, and faith.

The Commons is a 6,900 square foot dining hall and gathering space. “We grow as much fresh seasonal food here as possible and incorporate that into the menu. If the Library is the peaceful respite, the Commons is the heart of an active community - creating a space to gather and connect and share ideas. …Food is a common denominator,” Sharon expounds. “We have an elevated and yet incredibly approachable menu, that’s healthy, and absolutely delicious.” Incredibly, the pricing is about 20 to 30% below the average lunch bill in the area.

Photo: Melani Lust

The Pavilion is home to all things tea, and is where Frank Kwei can be found hosting regular tea tastings and demonstrations. An original member of the Grace Farms team, Frank is a zen influence on site. He’s a sommelier for tea, who presents an exquisite and informed tea service, elevating the entire notion of tea to another level. Not just something to be unconsciously consumed, but something to be savored and studied.

The Court is a multi-purpose recreational and performance space, equipped for large groups of people. The mezzanine provides space for board games, studying, and seats for spectators, while the Court plays host to everything from pickup basketball games to special exhibitions. “It was really important for us to provide a space that would best serve the community,” Sharon says. “And while we love hosting all kinds of pick-up and organized basketball games and other activities, we try to give first priority to those that usually get last dibs. …We work with organizations like STAR and ABILIS that provide services for people with intellectual and developmental  disabilities and their families, to give first dibs to everyone in these organizations to use the Court.”

The Outdoors The campus offers all kinds of community programming, from planting workshops to book groups for young children.

Grace Farms is open to the public six days a week - Tuesday-Saturday 10am - 5pm and Sunday from Noon to 5pm. The property has a mile of meandering walking trails and offers guided and meditative walks throughout the year. Everyone is welcome to walk the grounds, enjoy the Library, play in the Court, and use the Commons. “Grace Farms is here for the community! Without the activation of people… it’s just a beautiful building. If you’re a regular, we are glad that you are part of the fabric of Grace Farms… and if you’ve never been here - let this be your invitation to join us and discover, in any way you’d like - even if you just come and enjoy the nature, and leave here a little bit kinder, or calmer - it’s a meaningful contribution to creating grace and peace in the world.”

“But, even more important than our benefit to the local community as a physical and programming resource, Grace Farms is, first and foremost, a humanitarian institution,” Sharon proclaims.

“It is, by design, unlike anything else.  A place deliberately untethered from any preexisting model. A space intended for gathering and the dynamic exchange of ideas. …All in service of fostering grace and peace in the world.”

Turning to the elephant in the room... Sharon explains, “though faith is a pillar of my personal values and an initiative at Grace Farms, Grace Farms is not a religious institution. Since before we opened, we partnered with the Yale Center for Faith & Culture to help establish the framework and programming of our faith initiative - to explore the nature of flourishing and purposeful life. The unaffiliated Grace Community Church operated in our Sanctuary for several years and has moved on to a new venue. I get that having the name ‘Grace’ in both of our names was a bit confusing. But Grace Farms is not a church... and we welcome everyone - people of all faiths, or no faith - to Grace Farms.”

“As soon as Grace Farms opened, we immediately began convening thought-leadership gatherings to address pressing humanitarian issues,” Sharon recounts. “We are an incubator for global change. We’ve hosted Nobel Peace Prize-winner Dr. Denis Mukwege, human rights activists Grace Forrest and Nasreen Sheikh, U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo, and the United Nations. The organization abides by the, maybe benevolently ambitious, notion that new perspectives lead to new outcomes, and aims to facilitate opportunities for new outcomes to arise out of the shared gathering spaces as well as the spaces for introspection and intellectual enrichment. Some see the world as it is... we imagine what can be, gather a diverse team and partners, and put our commitments into action.”

During Covid, Grace Farms became a humanitarian hub, distributing more than 2 million pieces of PPE to first responders. It also provided food assistance which it continues to do today. Since 2020, Grace Farms has provided more than 151,000 healthy meals to those in need.

“Another of Grace Farms’ most important initiatives is Design for Freedom which is a collaboration of industry leaders focused on eliminating forced labor in the building materials supply chain,” Sharon reports. “I’d been awakened to modern slavery 25 years ago and it left a lingering and profound impression. In 2017, I was on an American Institute of Architects jury evaluating projects around the world. I asked where the materials that made up the buildings came from and if they were made with fair labor. I was met with silence. This led me to launch Design for Freedom.”

We began focusing on human trafficking legislation and ethical supply chains in the food and clothing industries,” Sharon relays of Design for Freedom’s history. “Next, we took on shelter.”

“The issue of modern slavery is monumental. More than 28 million people globally are presently living in forced labor conditions. The construction sector is the industrialized sector at the highest risk of forced and child labor.…We don’t have thirty years to fix this crisis like it took for the green building movement to take hold. …And, because there are a lot of people that have a vested interest in the status quo, no part of this is easy. …But we simply can’t be okay with the fact that forced labor subsidizes the construction industry with a slavery discount.”

Design For Freedom now includes government leaders, major architecture firms, top engineering companies, and leading universities. The initiative has produced toolkits, hosted global summits, and created pilot projects to model ethical supply chains. Recently, Grace Farms partnered with a tech startup to integrate a Design for Freedom filter into an AI-powered materials sourcing platform - a tangible tool for change. As Sharon says, “If you’re not asking the question ‘Was this made with fair labor?’...you’re being complicit. It doesn’t matter if you’re at Home Depot or working with a high-end architect. Everyone can ask the question. Everyone can be part of this. Raising awareness in the industry allows for informed conversations to take place, and a groundswell of support from consumers will eventually force the industry to move in the right direction from the bottom up as well. Grace Farms has been the facilitator of and location for many of those discussions.”

Managing to interject a light anecdote into even the darkest of topics, Sharon adds, “This year, Grace Farms hosted our fourth annual Design For Freedom Summit, bringing together builders, architects, and industry leaders from all over the world, as well as more than 75 students from over 25 different universities, in order to set explicit steps forward. For our first Summit in 2022, I had not yet decided on a keynote speaker. And then the former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad al Hussein, visited Grace Farms. While touring the property, we reached the Court and he spotted the ping pong table, and started talking about how good he was. ‘Winner takes all’, I said. If I won, he’d have to keynote our Summit. …I’m fairly sure I only won because he was laughing too hard to play!”

Sharon does turn to a little boasting when she’s talking about her son-in-law, Adam Thatcher, who co-founded and is the CEO of the Grace Farms Tea & Coffee Company - a certified B corporation - which gives 100% of profits to Design for Freedom. “Having studied the tax advantaged model of Newman’s Own at NYU Stern’s Business School, Adam implemented a similarly circular philanthropic model in establishing Grace Farms Tea & Coffee. We procure ethically sourced ingredients and materials, and have a particular focus on supporting femalefarmers and women-led co-ops.

…And Grace Farms Tea & Coffee is now available at Whole Foods and many corporate offices nationwide.”

Grace Farms Tea & Coffee will open a kiosk at the JP Morgan Chase headquarters in New York City this October!

“We are tackling important issues and building toward big goals. I’m not stopping to rest,” Sharon sets forth.

“We are just beginning and the possibilities are endless.”

Grace Farms is a gift to the community. They have carefully rewilded a substantial portion of the 80 acres of the campus, and biodiversity has flourished. Ten years ago there were 40 bird species on site, now there are over 140. Grace Farms is a nexus for culture, physical activity, education, food, and nature.

“It feels as if we are re-opening Grace Farms at this ten year mark. All that is unfolding in our 2025-2026 season, created by Chelsea, is the culmination of a decade of joy, hard work, and our team’s boundless determination and creativity.”

“While we have some pretty lofty goals in terms of solving global problems, Grace Farms’ novel approaches to some of the world’s most pressing challenges are already turning our aspirational vision into a lived and practical reality,” Sharon says.

Grace Farms has an extraordinary 10 year season planned, kicking off on September 13 with the opening of ParaPosition, Grace Farms’ first permanent outdoor sculpture, by Alicja Kwade. Its 10-Year celebration on October 11 includes musical performances, exhibit openings, tea and coffee tastings, and Sharon in conversation with Kazuyo Sejima of SANAA, followed by a performance by Joshua Bell. On January 10, Sharon opens a new kind of lecture series which features world-class musicians. Followed by a recital by Yo-Yo Ma on January 11!

“Grace Farms is 10 years old! Come visit… and get involved…” Sharon graciously implores.