Australia has plenty of people buying property. Fewer buying land like it’s a long game.
And then there’s Annie Cannon Brookes, quietly assembling a portfolio that looks less like a real estate strategy and more like a blueprint for how food, travel, and community might intersect over the next decade.
From the outside, Burradoo Park Farm reads like a pastoral postcard. Rolling acreage. A farm gate. The kind of place you expect to see a wedding shoot or a luxury escape brochure. But step back and the scale starts to register. This is not a vanity project. It’s infrastructure with a hospitality layer, and Three Blue Ducks sliding into the centre of it makes the intent unmistakable.
The play here isn’t just dining. It’s proximity. Bringing the restaurant experience closer to the source. Turning a working farm into something visitors can move through, not just consume from a distance.
The Dunk Island Experiment
Before the Southern Highlands became the focal point, there was Dunk Island. A storm battered resort site that sat idle for years, cycling through owners with big promises and little follow through.
The approach this time felt different from the outset. Less about spectacle. More about gradual restoration, access, and reactivation. The kind of long horizon thinking that suggests patience rather than publicity.
And that tone carries through to Burradoo.
The Southern Highlands Play
If Dunk Island is about environmental restoration, the Southern Highlands portfolio is about food systems.
Across Burradoo and surrounding farmland, Cannon Brookes has assembled a substantial agricultural footprint now being positioned as an agritourism and education precinct. The goal is not simply production, but public interface a place where visitors can see regenerative farming, eat locally grown produce, and participate in food education.
The announcement that Three Blue Ducks will open a restaurant, bakery, and produce hub on the working farm is a pivotal piece of that strategy.
Three Blue Ducks already carries strong credibility with urban diners who associate the brand with seasonal menus and ethical sourcing. Placing it at the centre of a farm ecosystem effectively shortens the distance between paddock and plate both literally and symbolically.
For BioHax readers, this matters because it reinforces a macro shift:
the next phase of wellness is not just supplements or trends, it's an infrastructure around food.
Image credit: Delicious Magazine — Darren Robertson, Annie Cannon Brookes, Andy Allen
What Will Actually Open At Burradoo
The scale of the project is now becoming clearer. Reporting confirms the Burradoo Park Farm site spans roughly 600 acres and will house not one but three distinct hospitality venues under the Three Blue Ducks umbrella.
The flagship restaurant will anchor the precinct with a produce first seasonal menu shaped entirely by what the farm grows and raises. Alongside it, a dedicated Bakehouse will focus on sourdough and daily staples, while a more casual Farmhouse space will operate as a café and produce store for both visitors and locals.
This layered approach matters because it transforms the site from a single dining destination into a functioning food ecosystem. Guests will not just eat there. They will be able to engage with guided farm tours, workshops, markets, and education programs, including a partnership with the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation aimed at hands on food learning for school children.
With staged openings beginning in early April, the Burradoo rollout signals that the project is moving from vision to operating reality.
Agritourism Taking Shape
The Ducks opening is not just another regional dining destination. It sits at the intersection of three larger currents:
-
Agritourism growth
Domestic travellers increasingly want immersive experiences tied to land and provenance. -
Food literacy as public health
Education initiatives tied to the farm including school programs position nutrition upstream rather than reactive. -
Regional economic diversification
Projects like this create local employment beyond traditional agriculture.
Taken together, it turns what could have been a private estate into a semi public ecosystem.
The SMART Collective Model
Underlying most of Cannon Brookes’ initiatives is SMART Collective, Annie's investment and philanthropic vehicle. Its structure blends:
- Impact investments
- Community partnerships
- Research and education funding
The through line is measurable outcomes rather than symbolic giving whether that is renewable infrastructure, affordable EV access, or food education programs.
This model reflects a broader global trend among next generation philanthropists deploying capital more like venture funding for social systems than traditional charity.
Wealth, Influence, and the New Land Narrative
Australia has a long history of wealthy individuals owning large tracts of land. What makes this moment different is the framing.
Instead of prestige assets, projects are increasingly positioned around:
- Sustainability
- Regeneration
- Public engagement
That narrative shift matters culturally. It reframes land ownership from status to stewardship whether that ultimately holds true will depend on long term outcomes, but the direction is clear.
Burradoo Park Farm is not just another regional opening to bookmark for a long lunch. It is a signal of where the culture is moving. Less spectacle. More substance. Less distance between production and experience.
Projects like this reshape expectations quietly. They turn the idea of dining into something spatial, immersive, and rooted in place rather than presentation. A farm you can walk through. A system you can see. A meal that starts long before it reaches the table.
Whether it becomes a blueprint or simply a moment in time will play out over the coming years. But for now, it stands as a reminder that the most interesting shifts rarely arrive with fanfare. They arrive with land, patience, and the kind of scale that changes how people think without needing to say a word.
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