Note to self

This is a bit of a note to self, but aren't all blog posts really?

Can't wait for this Natural Dye Symposium, to be held in Fitzroy Melbourne in June 2012. I know it's a year away, but with our big move down under the year is going to fly by and I'm already planning a few events to make our settling in period smooth as silk!

I'm also planning on booking this workshop with the most inspirational eco dye artist India Flint in December this year also in Melbourne.

We are a little in limbo until my partner is granted his visa, then we can book flight, book workshops, find land and start making our maker's farm a reality!

Community Fruits

I got all warm and fuzzy listening to a great report on ABC's Bush Telegraph Podcast broadcast on 21/2. It was about a fantastic initiative set up in Castlemaine, Victoria whereby a group of people are helping the local community help themselves to post-flood laden fruit trees in public areas just ripe for the picking. They are also going around to local growers and ordinary folk who might just have a pear tree in their garden that needs harvesting, pruning and a little tender loving care so that it may continue to produce fruit for future generations and at the same time feed the local community right now.

What a wonderful project and one that can be replicated across the world as we all strive to grow our own, buy local and eat local and help take the strain of the global food economy. One of their programmes is called Urban Food Maps, I'm still trying to find out the link to the original Castlemaine project. Such a project would work so well in London, there are countless fruit trees in parks that could be harvested. Our local Hackney City Farm has recently started a community edible garden that will be open to the public for harvesting and I have just discovered that there is a group called Hackney Harvest that mobilise the community to sites where harvesting is open and trees need planting. Why have I only just discovered this!

Well, blow me down, I have also just found out that this Australian initiative also exists right here in London and is called The London Orchard Project. It's great to know that all those plums are not going to waste this year!

Spiritual House

I found an inspiring article today in Frame Magazine about a contemporary designed building used to "accommodate spiritual, social and political gatherings for Pan Aboriginal groups across North America...The white cedar structure is a network of lamellar arches prefabricated from a computer model...As you enter, you smell the sage and sweet grass that are burned during meetings and counselling sessions." Imagine having such a peaceful space for contemplation and a cleansing of the senses... Read the article here
It's a magnificent building but practically speaking.. could a straw bale house be created from this kind of framework? with a render to the inside & outside..

Places of interest

I just discovered Fryers Forest which is an eco-village in central Victoria. I was surprised to learn that one of the founders of Permaculture was from Western Australia and this eco-village has been designed and developed by him entirely on his Permaculture principles. The eco village currently has homes for 27 villagers and includes a community orchard, three artificial lakes stocked with fish and a community house.

It would also be well worth a visit to Melliodora, for research/inspiration. This is a site located in the spa town Hepburn Springs, to quote: "It is one of the best documented and well known permaculture demonstration sites in Australia. The passive solar house, mixed food gardens, orchards, dams and livestock, and creek revegetation show how permaculture design can help to restore and improve land, provide for residents' needs and enjoyment in a cool inland climate."

And all this right in the neighbourhood of the area we are looking to establish our makers farm!

The dream visualisation revised edition

It was nearly two years ago that the first dream visualisation came to light and since then we have only really established a date for leaving the UK and have been working on a few practicalities like how to move/leave a growing UK based business etc... but I have been steadily growing impatient for change! What I needed was a renewed vision. So I set about sketching and this is what came of it. I was quite surprised by the amount of detail my minds eye could conjure. 

Here you can see we have some alpacas. Beautiful creatures for a small hobby farm, lovely soft wool for shearing and spinning and felting. We also have a few goats, for their versatility on a farm, their milk and their friendly cheeky spirit.

On the right here you can see in more detail the artist studios, up on higher ground, looking out across the valley a perfect spot for the star gazing and inspiration gathering. It's a passive solar structure of straw bale construction, not so much inspired but lifted from the pages of the beautiful book "The Hybrid House"

This is my family's dwelling, a strawbale/rammed earth construction with a green roof and a pebble and tile mosaic wall. I've taken some inspiration here for the look of part of this house from a book called "The Art of Natural Building". See the kitchen garden and outdoor clay oven.

In this detail you can also see the creek that runs through the property, with a tree house, for the children of course. The edible garden will be designed in line with permaculture principles and you can see there is a fruit orchard with an abundant juicy harvest.

This detail shows Dwelling number two with its Le Corbusier style roof. The creek runs into a beautiful pond with a deck over looking the lilies. The balcony over looks the valley below. It's a straw bale construction with a kitchen garden. (Mum and Dad, I've just drawn this in for the sake of the vision continuity, you'll have a more accurate vision of your own house I'm sure!)

Some of the workshops will have their own constructions, like the Green Woodworking Studios, based on those we saw at the inspiring Ruskin Mill College in Nailsworth, UK. As it states on the article I have linked to above, at the college "students help harvest and fell timber in the local woodlands to provide a source of unseasoned material (green wood) for use in the workshop. As the wood contains a high level of moisture it is easy to split and shape. Green wood working uses hand tools and simple human powered devices - pole lathes, shaving horses, axes, draw knives and chisels. Students craft a range of objects from simple gardening dibbers to bowls, stools and chairs...". I've always admired the beautiful circular Dovecotes dotted around Normandy and I can imagine one could work beautifully as a pottery studio...

This image shows the accommodation available for visitors, artists in residence, friends and family from the UK or workshop participants. There is a yurt, also a communal space for gatherings when not in use, a gypsy wagon and an artistically decorated static caravan. This is situated on the creek with it's conveniently placed swimming hole complete with tyre swing. There is also space for a few tipi tents. 

So there you have it, a vision from the mind of an optimist, a dreamer... perhaps naive, perhaps ambitious but I am nevertheless setting an intention for a space of great creativity, beauty, productivity, health, growth and happiness. 

The dreaming begins

This dream visualisation first came to me in 2009, I started drawing, which turned into a painting that started to visualise a concept of communal living/working that I had been very interested in exploring. The picture went something like this...

My dream involved starting this project with a team of enthusiasts, my partner (designer/potter/painter), son Merlin (muse), Mum (artist/permaculture/landscape/strawbale dreamer), Dad (craftsman/carpenter/builder/astronomer) and me (knitter/fiber artist/general maker of things). We would find land outside Melbourne, build separate sustainable dwellings, some shared artist studios, run workshops, invite artists and craftsmen from around the world to share their passion with budding makers.

The land would become a place for gathering, for doing, fulfilling, for living and working and have many different income streams so that life could become as self sustaining as it can possibly be in today's world.

As you can tell, this is a work in progress firmly situated in the dream space, but as time goes on, I hope this blog will slowly reveal the transition from dream to reality.