You want to live in a community that is in touch with nature?

You want to actively shape and build the community yourself?

You're looking for the right people and a piece of land?

Hi there,

we're Helena, Valentin and Jaro, and if your answer to the previous questions was "yes", you're feeling just like us!

We've had enough of small family life in the big city and are dreaming of living together with others in a community in touch with nature. So far, however, we're still lacking the community and the right piece of land. But we want to change that now!

So we're looking for people with a similar vision, who would like to live in community with us. And we're looking for the right piece of land.

Our vision

We want to be part of a small community that lives together in a "healthy neighbourhood" in touch with nature. Together we want to create a space in which we can experiment with alternative forms of living together with other people and the land. We also envision this space to be a catalyst for creativity, workshops, political activism and personal development.

A vision for a community should of course be the result of a collective process. However, we believe that the existence of a similar common vision is important for the success of a joint project. That's why we want to describe our ideas here as precisely as possible.

Below we have set out our ideas in more detail, while at the same time describing the (many) open questions that can only be answered in a community process.

Who we are

Since Jaro was born last year, there are three of us and we're living together in Berlin. Here we try to spend as much time as possible outside, preferably taking our bikes and Jaro in his trailer into the green surroundings of the city. We also have a lot of fun decorating our apartment, but we're starting to run out of space for yet more house plants.

We like to stay active, we enjoy eating good and tasty food (as regional and seasonal as possible), we love coffee and we don’t want to miss out on good music. In spite of living the atomic family life, we try to get as much colour in our social life as possible and in summer we like to travel extensively with our bus Carlos.

Helena

Helena

Helena loves to spend all day in the sun, likes being in and around water, enjoys eating what others cook for her, likes doing yoga, is good at listening, enjoys walking barefoot, likes listening to all kinds of nice and funky music and is always up for three scoops of ice cream. At the moment she is experimenting with analogue photography. After studying Sports and Spanish in Cologne, she is now about to finish her psychology bachelors degree. Helena has many ideas that she would like to realise: These include building a small bathing lake (or pond) if there’s none nearby; building a tree house; starting a practice for psychotherapy in a nearby town (or maybe a café); and experimenting with alternative forms of therapy.

Valentin

Valentin

Valentin likes being outdoors, likes to cook delicious, healthy and large meals, has a permaculture blog, likes building things, likes doing yoga, can code websites, is fond of aesthetics, enjoys walking barefoot and likes listening to techno, dub and downtempo music. Valentin's got a degree in Organic-Agricultural Management and is currently working in organisational development as an innovation consultant. Sometimes he has trouble sleeping because all his ideas keep him awake: He wants to set up a market garden; design the landscape according to permaculture principles; offer workshops and yoga classes; build buildings with natural materials; and keep pigs, chickens and ducks.

Jaro

Jaro

Jaro loves birds, dogs, flowers and also likes being outdoors. He likes to laugh a lot, sometimes he doesn't like going to bed (because the day is still way too exciting), at the moment he loves eating pasta and he enjoys being driven around in a bike trailer. At the moment he unfortunately spends far too much time indoors and without same-age playmates. Jaro will therefore be especially happy about other children with whom he can discover the world.

What exactly do you have in mind?

In general, we think it is important that everyone is aware of their ideas and expectations from the outset. Because before we decide to embark on such a project together, we should be sure that we have the same basic ideas.

For this reason, we have spent some time thinking about our wishes and ideas and realised that we have some concrete expectations. However, we also have at least as many open questions which, in our opinion, can only be answered in the Community process.

Our ideas

  • When to start?

    We are now ready to take this step and need people who are also ready! Ideally we have a piece of land within the next 2-3 years and can get started.

  • The place

    We have a rough idea of where we would like to live: From central to southwest Germany or near the border in Belgium. We need at least a few hectares of land, and the area should of course be beautiful (and green) :)
    Also, a city with at least 30,000 inhabitants in the vicinity (about 30km) would be good, e.g. to sell on the market.

  • Living together

    Community is important to us, and we want the project to be established and sustained collectively. Once the core group is in place, decisions should be made collectively and we would like a part of life to take place together.

    At the same time a balance between community and private life is important to us. In the long run we would love to live in our own hobbit house.

  • The size

    In the long term we imagine a manageable core of 4-8 "parties" (aka families / partnerships / individuals) who are an integral part of the community. This is of course a crude house number, but we don't intend to create a huge ecovillage – although a larger community with several smaller "neighbourhoods" might be an option.

  • Connectedness to nature

    We want to live in touch with nature, which also means as consistently ecological as possible. We would like to design the land according to permaculture principles and be energy independent and largely self-sufficient in the long term.
    For us, this also means relying on simple, natural and cheap means rather than using high-tech solutions. In other words, building as much as possible ourselves, upcycling and using local solutions.

  • Social contribution

    It is important to us to actively work towards societal change and not to withdraw from society. We want to be open to everyone and offer a space for social encounters as well as a platform for creativity, workshops, political activism, self-development, philosophising, and experimentation.

  • Playful attitude

    We have ambitious plans and many projects in mind, but we nevertheless find it important not to forget about the importance of lightness. That means in practice that we also want to celebrate festivals, realise projects with joy and pleasure and celebrate life!

Open questions

  • The community

    The biggest open question is who will ultimately be living in community with us. Of course this depends, among other things, on whether you contact us now and whether you can imagine living with us. Here we should rely on our gut feeling and trust that we will quickly notice whether it fits or not.

  • Financial questions

    We have some savings and financing possibilities, but they are limited, and of course the project should be jointly financed. How the financing of the land and other expenditures will be dealt with in a fair way and how to deal with possible different financial circumstances of different members must be decided collectively. We might also be able to claim funding for some things.

  • Specific projects

    We have plenty of project ideas that we would like to get involved with. These include the regeneration and design of the land, a market garden for commercial vegetable cultivation, a workshop space, permaculture workshops, yoga classes, workshop facilities, planting a forest garden, animal husbandry and many more. Which projects are finally implemented and who does what depends of course on everyone involved.

  • Community activities

    We find it important that all members actively participate in community life and in each "party" at least one person is mainly involved in a project on the land (while the other person may have an outside job). What exactly the community activities are has to be thought about and developed together. Of course "meetings" and decision-making mechanisms play a role in this, but also things like common meals, community projects (e.g. building houses, regeneration and design of the land), etc.

  • The name

    Of course there is no name for the project yet, which will surely reveal itself to the community at the right time.

Who exactly are you looking for now?

Project partners

We see ourselves as initiators and are looking for project partners who would like to realise a joint project with us. If this is something you can imagine, if you have ideas of your own that will enrich the project, if you are ready to start in the foreseeable future and if your ideas match our ideas, we are looking for you!

Supporters

If you find all this exciting, but don't want to take part, you can still help us! In the future we also need people who support us locally to realise projects; who come to visit us, participate in workshops or support one or the other crowdfunding campaign. You can sign up for our newsletter to stay posted.

Spreaders

We also want to reach as many people as possible and need you to spread the word: If you share our site in your social media channels and with anyone who might be interested, you are doing us a huge favour!

**UPDATE** With Hof Lebensberg we have found a community in the making, where our dreams (and much more) can become reality! You can read the whole story in our Newsletter #1.

So, what happens next?

That's where you come in! What do you think of our project?

If you want to know anything else, have suggestions, know about a piece of land or want to contact us for any other reason, you can write us here.

Otherwise we also receive emails at hola@landcommunityproject.com.

Join us!

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