About – From Shimla

ABOUT US

A Creative Revolution by the Farmers of Shimla, India.

Farming | Music | Experiences

As generational apple cultivators with ancestral apple orchards, Himanshu Khagta & Pranav Rawat created From Shimla during the first wave of the Covid 19 pandemic as a way of making freshly plucked apples available to their friends in the cities. Over that apple season, the idea took a life of its own and from otherwise providing fresh apples only to limited Mandis in bulk, the initiative gave them the opportunity to share their harvest and bounty and that of their fellow farmer friends, directly with the consumers.

From Shimla is now a growing community of like-minded people, living and working in the mountains. The pandemic saw the current generation return to their roots and rediscover the unhurried mountain life. Many of them have chosen to get involved with their respective farms, slowly revolutionizing the way the apple orchards are run- learning from the generation before them and applying to that the technology that they are so well versed with.

Our Story

While munching on some sweet Dehydrated Apricots & Pears Pranav was providing to a few adventure travel companies, Himanshu wondered why they weren’t sharing these with the world beyond.

Out of sheer curiosity to see how far this intention could carry itself, Himanshu registered FromShimla.com that very evening. By the next afternoon, the website was launched with just those two products and the end of that week saw them shipping over 100 orders across the country.

As the orders for the dehydrated fruits kept steadily pouring in, by August, the valley had launched itself full throttle into the Apple harvest season and thus bloomed the idea of making freshly plucked fruits available to their friends in the cities.

A few friends joined hands with Himanshu and Pranav and limited quantities of apples from everyone’s orchards were listed on the website. Over the course of two days a system was put in place and through trial and error, the first two successful deliveries were made to Chennai and Imphal.