Fat Fox Mushrooms' story
Fat Fox Mushrooms was born out of founders Ben and Lex's burning passion to share their love for the fungi kingdom! For many years Ben has been fascinated with the world of fungi. Whether it be spending time foraging wild mushrooms in the Finnish forest or carrying out his own mushroom experiments, he always had one foot in the fungi world. In 2020, when the world went into lockdown Ben and Lex decided to join forces and come up with a creative way to share the joy of mushroom cultivation with a wider audience. With the help of a grant of £500 from the council they provided 100 free kits to local residents to grow their mushrooms at home and share their experiences, and so Fat Fox Mushrooms was born. They began selling home-grown mushrooms to friends and neighbours at a stall outside their studios, and since then they have continued to grow, harvest and package every aspect of the process to ensure that each product is handmade and personal.
Fat Fox Mushrooms' urban mushroom studio in Tottenham, London now offers: mushroom growing kits, mushroom cultivation workshops & online courses, fungi-inspired artwork and mushroom extracts which can be used to improve health and wellbeing. They also continue to partner and collaborate with others; especially those within the fungi-loving community. For example, recently for Markfield Road Festival 2023, Fat Fox Mushrooms helped to create 'The Mushroom Lab'; an art installation at local space Unit 3 N15 exploring the many uses of fungi, in collaboration with urban landscapers Wild City Studios and sound artist Brian d'Souza.
Fat Fox mushrooms successfully combined Ben's practical ability for mushroom cultivation with Lex's passion for creative community outreach, which has meant that interest in their products has only grown and grown! Through alternative materials, medicinal qualities and their role in the natural world, Ben and Lex believe that Fungi have the potential to play a key role in shaping all of our futures!
Useful learnings from Fat Fox Mushrooms
- The importance of collaboration; there are lots of opportunities for collaboration with people who are really fascinated by fungi and fungi growing.
- Understand your different funding routes. Fat Fox Mushrooms is a business, so in order to continue to provide community-led fungi and mushroom cultivation through events, workshops and growing projects, we also established social entreprise 'The Fungi Club'. As a social entreprise, The Fungi Club can receive different funding pathways, and continue setting up mushroom growing spaces at community gardens, allotments and schools, to help connect people with nature and sustainable food systems as a means of developing individual wellbeing and community cohesion.
Fat Fox Mushrooms' metrics
Number of workshop attendees.
Number of returning customers.
Number of collaborations with other organisations.
