“A home where the buffalo roam” sounds like a throwback to pioneer days, but for wife and husband Laura Lee Brown and Steve Wilson, owners of Goshen, Kentucky’s, Woodland Farm, it’s just another way to describe where they live. Woodland’s herd of American buffalo (or bison; the terms are used interchangeably in North America) is raised sustainably on grass pasture, and Woodland’s bison meat is beloved by Louisville chefs and food lovers alike. Alongside the bison are heritage breed Mulefoot and Hereford pigs, and Egyptian Fayoumi chickens, as well as working teams of horses, hives of bees, and assorted wildlife.
Brown and Wilson, entrepreneurs who launched a chain of art gallery boutique hotels called 21c Museum Hotels, took on Woodland, a 19th-century Georgian estate on a bend of the Ohio River, just as it was about to be developed. Then they hired a farm team, including a manager and a horticulturist, to grow everything, from vegetables to animals, sustainably, which also means building things from lumber that comes from their own land and not spraying anything that ends with “ide.”
Woodland is also a home where the art roams. Sculptures from the couple’s modern-art collection dot the property. In addition, it’s a place where, among the orchards and fields and greenhouses, people come to learn through programs focusing on the garden, livestock, and wildlife.