If you would like to build your own home on a smallholding, and produce food, fuel and other products for your family and your local community, but can’t see any way that it could happen, then the Ecological Land Co-op want to hear from you.  Read more

Here’s a quick overview of what the Ecological Land Co-op does, before going on to their latest news. The problem that they were formed to solve is that many people who would like to build a home made from local, sustainable materials, Read more

As a new generation of aspiring land stewards, we wish to minimise dependence on fossil fuels whilst learning to meet our basic needs of food, shelter, energy and livelihood, from the land.  This has been entirely possible for millennia. However, in a 21st century Read more

Landmatters co-op is a low impact community in Devon. We’re seeking letters of support for a new round of planning application. Letters of support are invaluable commendations and hugely boosting for a project’s prospects – and morale.  Read more

You may remember a previous article about Charlie and Meg’s natural home in Pembrokeshire, that the planners decided needed to be bulldozed because it was ‘harmful to the rural character of the locality’. See here. Read more

Being able to go through the process of making a planning application for a low impact development may be a sign that there has been some progress for those of us who have hitherto lived, to paraphrase, as outlaws on the planning frontier. Read more

We moved to Wales because of an extraordinary Welsh Government policy. I shan’t lie, despite all experience and political conviction to the contrary, we were optimistic. One Planet Development seemed to be the kind of advance for low impact living and sustainable land use that we had been hoping for Read more

Anna and Pete Grugeon of the Bulworthy Project share their experiences and advice for anyone seeking to gain planning permission for an off-grid, self-build home. Read more

There’s a general feeling – and a growing one I think – that we’re headed for disaster, and that no-one is in control or able to steer us away from the precipice. Here are four categories of reasons that people give for pessimism about the near future: Read more

Here’s an opportunity to you potential smallholders / rat-race escapees: A thirty acre field next to the Lammas ecovillage has come up for sale.  Read more

This is an opportunity to represent and to support our friends at the Steward Community Woodland in their application for permanent planning permission. After 15 years of successful experimentation in sustainable living, they are now applying for permanent planning permission Read more

This blog is about the house that Charlie and Meg built. It’s a straw-bale roundhouse with a reciprocal roof, built in the countryside where they grew up. The exterior can be seen above, the interior below, with Charlie, Meg and sprog in the middle. Read more

Remember this blog post about the Ecological Land Co-op’s attempt to start three eco-smallholdings in Devon? A local councillor said: “Nobody would subject themselves to that way of life. You might as well be in prison“ Read more

Charlie, who built this beautiful straw bale roundhouse, is a young man with a young family and like many finds it impossible to afford a home. In Charlie’s case he had three things going for him. Read more

Well, the world didn’t end yesterday, so let’s make it better in 2013. A crucial element of a just and sustainable world is land reform. Why should so few people own so much land? Here’s a great blog from Shaun about why access to land is so important. Read more

First some background, then below is Zoe’s appeal for letters of support. Wouldn’t it be good if people were allowed to put up their own natural home on their own land, to produce food for themselves and for the rest of us. Read more

We think so. As long as we do it in a low-impact way. We’re not talking second homes, commuter homes or retirement homes. We’re talking about people who want to work the land organically, be part of the local economy, plant trees, build a home Read more