Entrepreneur bet the farm on artwork
Farmboy CEO went from Prairie life to furnishing 3,000 hotels worldwide
Todd Towers has no time for the pretension that can surround the art and design world — and it was one of the main reasons he founded Farmboy Fine Arts some 20 years ago when he graduated from art school.
“I got out of art school and went and looked at galleries, and gallerists looked at me like I had the plague or something — like, ‘Why are you here?’ And if I felt intimidated,” he says, “what does my father, who’s a cowboy, feel like?”
Farmboy — of which Towers is president and CEO — is an art consultancy that produces and delivers custom artwork for hospitality, health-care and corporate spaces. Its hotel client list includes chains like Marriott, Hyatt, Fairmont and W Hotels.
The name Farmboy is a reference to Towers’ heritage. He grew up on a cattle ranch in Red Deer, Alta., and says it took his family some time to accept his desire to go to art school.
“My family, much like most of us at some point, came over from somewhere else in the 1800s and we staked a claim and we were farmers,” he says. “I’m sixth generation, so my background is very much an agrarian background — it’s all about farming and ranching.”
He says these farmyard fundamentals — working with others to achieve a mutual goal, for instance — formed the basis for his company.
“Some of the agrarian principles of community, working together, collaboration — these are all words today that seem almost overused in the art world, but back then they weren’t, they were unique,” he says. “Back then, it wasn’t interdisciplinary studies — you focused on something and didn’t talk to the other guys. Painters didn’t talk to sculptors, sculptors didn’t talk to photographers — it just wasn’t really thought of, but now everyone works together.”
An entrepreneurial drive to make it happen is what led to him securing his first large contract (in 2003 and 2004) and one that set his company in motion, he says, getting word there was going to be a W Hotel built in South Korea.
“I was broke,” he says. “Deadarse broke, doing all sorts of jobs, and saved up my money and got over to South Korea and showed up on site and they said: ‘Why are you here? This isn’t how this works. You’re a crazy person.’ ”
He was eventually directed to the project’s architect, designer and purchaser. A few plane trips and long drives later (from Calgary to San Francisco), the W Hotel in South Korea became Farmboy’s first big contract.
“I still don’t know how I did it,” he says.
“It was really very lucky, and then I had to deliver, manufacture — that was like 2,200 pieces.”
Farmboy has provided bespoke artwork for over 3,000 hotels around the globe and is producing over 35,000 pieces for a hotel in Las Vegas, Towers says.
“You’re creating conceptual ideas, building specific content for that brand and then you have to produce the content,” he says.
Towers believes there is a “collective value in the design experience” in a well-designed space, and says his company’s motto is based on making people’s lives better through art.
“People look at it now as a real value to their hotel, or to their business, or their home,” he says. “You walk into a hotel and you’re seeing a wonderfully designed furniture package with the right design package put together in a way that makes sense to the brand, users’ overall experience of the hotel — there’s value there, and art plays a big part in that.”
The value of art is something Towers has spent a lot of time thinking about, recently launching the Farmboy Art Fund. The $1-million fund is made up of contemporary artwork (at an average spend of $20,000) that includes paintings, photography, print multiples — “if they’re rare and strong,” he says — and sculpture, which he leases to businesses like hotels, making them assets that generate revenue.
Towers came up with the idea after attending shows like Art Basel (the art fair that runs in Hong Kong, Miami and Basel, Switzerland) and witnessing how accessible art is becoming — highnet-worth individuals collecting alongside new art lovers — and the growth in buying and selling art online, which he supports, believing it’s creating more visibility and accessibility in the art world.
He also saw, in his industry, hoteliers recognizing the value of art as an asset, and providing a complete experience for their customers, but reluctant to spend the money on purchasing art, so leasing artwork works well.
“When I walk into a hotel and it’s a gorgeous property, welldesigned, wonderful furniture, things look right,” Towers says. “I want to stay there, and I want to come back.”