News and Media
The extraordinary architecture, planning and people of Tryon have been making regional and national news for more than a decade. The New York Times, Dwell, the Wall Street Journal have all recognized that Tryon is a model for sustainable development and an overall swell place to live!
Crain's Chicago Business
Can this man launch Harbor Country 2.0?
June 29, 2017
Rob Harte is moving his gaze from Chicago condos to focus on real estate along the Lake Michigan shoreline of Indiana and Michigan. Dennis Rodkin informs his readers about the increased interest in second properties in these areas, as well as the increased hip-ness of these small vacation towns. Tryon Farm is one of these investments Rob Harte is planning to focus on.
Linkedin
In Life and Story – Less is More.
December 29, 2017
After sharing devastating data from the American Farmland Trust of farmland long lost to development, Ian Magrisso goes on to describe the "heart" behind Tryon Farm. His beautiful video "Tryon Farm, A Community Built with Heart" and photos embrace all that makes Tryon Farm special in it's community and it's primary goal to integrate a planned development into the surrounding environment.
Lake Michigan Shore
Swimming naturally: Tryon Farm builds an oasis in the wilds of Michigan City
April 27, 2015
Julie Kessler writes a thorough history of Tryon Farm's natural swimming pond. Starting with the initial concepts through the design and installation to today's second full season splashing around in the water.
"This is no pond formed by terrain and standing water, half-covered by algae. It's a carefully designed communal swimming pond at Tryon Farm, where ingenuity and nature meet to create environmentally friendly spaces."
Crain's Chicago Business
Hate chlorine? Leery of lakes? Here's a pool for you
May 26, 2014
An overview of Natural swimming pools and their increased presence in the United States. While the article explains the function and sustainable benefits of natural swimming pools, they spend time focusing on Tryon Farm's new swimming pond.
"The Tryon pond has a 1,950-square-foot swim area. 'It would seem kind of off to have a typical chemical pool in an environment like that,' says Dawn Heid, an architect who lives at Tryon Farm on weekends and in Lincoln Park weekdays."
chicagobusiness.com
Download PDF [5.2MB]
InsideHook Chicago
Farm Villa | A bucolic getaway a stone's throw from the city
March 3, 2014
A wonderful write up about the benefits of a retreat to "green pastures."
"You won't find anything quite like Tryon so close to home: a dairy farm-cum-conservation development where folks build smart, modern homes — some of them available for short-term rental."
The article highlights vacation homes that you can rent at Tryon Farm, as well as Tryon Farm Guest House - the inviting B&B located at Tryon Farm.
Lakefront Neighbors
The Noonans Create a Community
January 2014
by Erin Gerard | Publisher
Photographs by Alison Hoover
This article introduces the family behind Tryon Farm and how this unique conservation community evolved from it's inception to its current state of environmentally sensitive homes and its wonderful group of neighbors.
Download PDF [844kb]
Notre Dame Magazine
At Home in the Land
Autumn 2013
by Jessica Trobaugh Temple
Photographs by Barbara Johnston/University of Notre Dame
A wonderful article describing the history and philosophy of Tryon Farm along with beautiful photographs by Barbara Johnston/University of Notre Dame.
Daily Herald
Acres of farmland converted into residential living
August 5, 2013
By Jean Murphy
The Daily Herald focuses on sustainable developments in rural settings and the types of people who are looking to live on them. While the active lifestyle of todays retirees are initially described, the article goes on to point out all types of homeowners who are drawn to these settings.
Tryon Farm is one of two developments highlighted and the article's example of a successful existing development.
Urban Farm
Oh, Give Me a Home
May/June 2011
by Sharon Biggs Waller
Forget the golf-course community—make my suburban homestead in an organic-farm subdivision.
The Times
An eco-friendly hideaway at Tryon Farms Dunes Settlement
January 8, 2011
By Julie Dean Kessler
Going green in construction ranges from simple alternatives to sophisticated techniques. At Tryon Farm, all pond houses have green roofs that can include planted moss, sedum, and grass, cutting down heat gain and controlling and filtering water runoff...
CS Interiors
Farm Fresh
Summer 2009
Scratched your Thoreauvian itch lately? If not, take a long, slow Sunday swing around the bottom of Lake Michigan. Just short of the Michigan border you'll find a place where fresh mown alfalfa perfumes the air, long legged herons circle overhead and wildflower dotted paths connect six intimate clusters of modern homes and the conservation minded homeowners who love them.
Download PDF [3.5M]
Shore Magazine
The Green Issue: Grass Roofs
April 2008
Because the Noonans wanted to build a green community, they researched green roofs ... "We wanted to do this because they are environmentally terrific and the homes inside are so much cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter," Noonan says. Tryon Farm currently has three sod roofs finished and plans six more this year.
Lake
Green Acres -- How Tryon Farm developer Ed Noonan went green before it became a trendy movement
Feb/Mar 2008
Ed Noonan has put a new spin on life down on the farm. The 67 families residing at his 170-acre Tryon Farm, in Michigan City, Ind., and the 83 families yet to come, each own 1/150th of the acreage that Tryon maintains as never-to-be-developed woods and farmland, where their houses are clustered and open land predominates.
Dwell
A New Shade of Green: Farm Team
November 2007
But what truly distinguishes Tryon from other conservation communities ... is that its development strategy is coupled with progressive architecture.
[Turned] the farm's 170 acres into a working sustainable development, complete with a natural wetlands sewage system, which operates independently of a municipal system, and biophilic berm houses that are embraced on all sides by wildflowers and native grasses.
The Wall Street Journal
For Sale: Condo W/Chicken Coop
May 17, 2007
Catering to Americans' desire to live "green," developers around the country are creating communities on or adjoining farms, pitching views of sorghum fields, grazing livestock, and local -- very local -- food, such as eggs residents collect from the property's henhouse ...
Natural Home
Gathering Together: Communities That Serve People and Planet
January 2007
Located an hour's drive or train ride east of Chicago, Tryon Farm encompasses a prairie, farmland, ponds, dunes and woods within its 170 acres. ... While a traditional homebuilder might have bulldozed the dunes, filled in the wetlands and covered the prairie with tract homes, developer and architect Ed Noonan and his wife, Eve, had a different vision. They created homes that nestle into the landscape, disturbing it as little as possible. ...
other comments
Michigan City, Indiana was recently named one of 5 terrific & affordable locations. Smart Money
"Tryon Farm, in northern Indiana, breaks new ground for new-home development." Chicago Tribune
"It's a modern-day Little House On the Prairie... a conservation development dedicated to keeping its land as natural as possible." Chicago Sun-Times
"Tryon Farm (is) an environmentally sensitive farm-based development in NW Indiana that takes advantage of a growing demand for community, kinship, and distinctive homes amid wide-open natural spaces....at Tryon Farm homeowners can also see goats, herds of deer in the meadows, alfalfa in working fields and rare green herons prancing stoically in restored wetlands." New York Times
"The simple but elegant Tryon Farm is gaining national attention as the wave of smart future housing... it's also helping visitors unravel some of the conundrums of modern life." The Times (Portage, Indiana)
"Development usually clashes with preserving green space, but Tryon Farm has shown land can be set aside, not by government requirement, but because people want it." The News-Dispatch, (Michigan City, Indiana)
"Expansion of urban areas into the countryside seems inevitable. Thankfully, developments like Tryon Farm are proving that all new housing doesn't have to be in cookie cutter subdivisions." The News-Dispatch, (Michigan City, Indiana)
"The Dennis family first bought a little 600 square foot cabin in Tryon as a weekend get-away. After a few years of falling in love with the conserved land and the fabulous architecture that blends contemporary design with structures that are in complete harmony with the natural surroundings, they purchased a 2,000 square foot permanent home." On Common Ground (Winter 2006)
"The land exudes the quiet and stillness of a rural area...combatting the suburban malaise and preserving a bit of the natural habitat." Conscious Choice magazine
"You have the feeling that Thoreau would have approved of Tryon Farm. The principles of economy - of working with what you have - are honored...." Organic Style
