Black Forest is an unincorporated community and a census-designated place (CDP) located in El Paso County, Colorado, United States.

Although the origin of the name is not clear, that portion of the Pineries north of Colorado Springs became known as the "Black Forest" by around the turn of the century.

[5] Arrowheads and charcoal pits provide evidence that the planning area was occupied by Native Americans at least 800 years ago.

Almost 40 years later, the Arapahoe and Cheyenne tribes joined forces to drive out the Kiowas and become the last Native Americans to inhabit the area.

When American pioneers began to settle the region in the late 1850s the Black Forest became an important center of activity, primarily as a source of scarce timber.

General Palmer was the first major landowner of Black Forest when he established the Colorado Pinery Trust in 1870; he purchased 43,000 acres.

Logging in the Pineries reached its height in the summer of 1870 when over 700 teamsters and 1,000 lumberjacks and tie hacks were employed, mostly for railway work.

More than one billion board feet of lumber were removed to provide ties for the Kansas Pacific, Denver and Rio Grande and New Orleans Railroads.

A wide variety of crops were raised, including cattle, sheep, alfalfa, wheat, corn, hay and beans.

Agricultural productivity was subject to boom and bust cycles with crops often ruined by drought, floods, hail, blizzards, or grasshoppers.

During the same period, numerous large lot residential subdivisions have been platted and developed in the planning area, allowing it to retain much of its rural character and a good bit of its historic legacy.

[9] Based on number of homes destroyed, it surpassed the Waldo Canyon Fire in the same county the previous year as the most destructive wildfire in Colorado history.