Lammas Part Six and a Half - Pembrokeshire and Basket-making

Our cob course came to an end on Friday afternoon but we weren't quite finished with West Wales or Lammas yet.
I had planned to spend Saturday visiting the Centre for Alternative Technology, mostly out of nostalgia for my student days in the Green Society when we all piled into a van and headed west to volunteer at what was then a grassroots project in its infancy.
In the end I decided against visiting for fear that it would be an anti-climax. I am glad it has done so well, but when organisations go mainstream I usually bail out.

Instead we explored the Pembrokeshire coast. It was pretty but access was limited and hence each National Trust car park was full of cars. Instead we found a footpath leading down to the coast away from the crowds and had a relatively short walk in the sunshine.
The day was enjoyable but useful too as it helped us decide this would probably not be the best area to come back to with the dogs.

We even found an old wool mill to look around, but we resisted the temptation to spend.

On Sunday we returned to Cassie's place to learn how to make a frame basket. There were only four course participants. The weather was glorious, so much so that we had to move into the shade.
We had a lovely day making our baskets under Cassie's expert guidance.

Almost as importantly we came away with two very presentable and usable baskets.

This is something I definitely need to make the time to develop. It appeals to my love of natural materials and to my love of mathematical pattern. I should even be able to grow most of the basketry willow that I need.
Who knows, maybe some day I will become skilled enough to lead my own courses.

And that was that.
Into the car and ready for the long drive home.
We rolled back onto the farm just as it was getting dark. We were both looking forward to seeing the dogs again. Arthur was beside himself with joy at our return. Boris was happy to be meeting someone new. I'm sure he actually remembered who we were!
Getting to sleep that night was difficult. We had come back to the hot side of the country and even at 10 o'clock the temperature was way above 20 degrees. Beside that, my head was absolutely buzzing with ideas and plans.

Lammas Part Five - Inspiration - The Lammas Earth Project and One Planet Development

I was a little confused about the Lammas EcoVillage before I visited. For on the web there seemed to be two websites, one for Lammas Eco-Village and one for Lammas Earth Centre. It was hard to work out how they linked.

I now know a lot more about the project though. It started about ten years ago. There had previously been a history of people and communities building low-impact houses on land in this part of Wales. These had inevitably come into conflict with the authorities, in particular rules on planning.

One of the people who spent all of his adult life in these alternative communities was Paul Wimbush(now known as Tao). It must be said that Paul's appearance is between that of Robin Hood and Jesus! But at the heart of it he is a true visionary. He lives in the smallholding along from Cassie and Nigel with his wife Hoppi and a coule of teenage children. We were treated to a whistlestop tour of their place by Tao and it was truly inspirational.
As far as I can work out, just over ten years ago Paul decided to start up a low impact eco community but determined to work within the rules of the planning authorities. I don't know quite how, but at some point Pembrokeshire Council adopted a scheme known as One Planet Development. This allows for people to build on a piece of land as long as the house is low impact and you go back to working the land.

'The aim is ambitious: in a small country where people on average use three times their fair share of the world's resources, Wales wants its One Planet people to use only the resources they are due. Which means a simpler smallholding life, spending and travelling less, growing and making more.'

An old sheep farm came up for sale, 70+ acres. The original idea was to divide it up into over fifty plots, but that ended up being nine, so about 7 acres each. Apparently the rules get a lot more complicated when such co-operative ventures go into double figures of participants.
And so the project started. One Planet Development has now been rolled out across Wales. It is not seen by the authorities as a model for wider society, but it does give permission for a niche to exist. If only Fenland Council would do the same! The chances of that are probably less than zero, but if I ever work up the enthusiasm maybe I will sound them out. I'm sure there was a time when it seemed as if Pembrokeshire Council would never entertain such a thought.

Anyway I said that Tao and Hoppi's place was truly inspiring, so I will leave you with some images and some more information about their plot.

A celebration of Tao's carpentry and design skills, this was built to house his milking cattle,

now sadly gone due to the complexities of selling raw milk.

From a distance Tao's newest project, the temple-like Earth Centre, rises imposingly above the smallholding.

A retreat space

A goose house to envy!

Being on a hillside means that water can run from pond to pond.

Incorporated into this is a grey water harvesting system which runs into an S-shaped reedbed.

As with my smallholding, Tao uses the animals as helpers. The geese are in charge of keeping the grass down in the orchard.

Elephant grass growing as a biomass crop for shredding into compost and as mulch.

You can never have enough biomass in a  productive garden, especially a permaculture one, 

capturing the sun's energy and putting into the soil. The polytunnel contained a small pond

and rocky landscaping to store the day's heat and to provide a home for friendly predators.

It was an ideal spot for a touch of warm relaxation and reflection.

Both these ideas will be coming to Swallow Farm in the near future!

Tipis act as a venue for events and doubtless go back to Paul's time in Tipi Valley.

There are many buildings and places for volunteers to stay. 

Tao had about half a dozen volunteers staying while we were there.

Our place may not be so famous or so idyllic, but volunteers do seem like a good idea 

and I think we still have a lot to offer at Swallow Farm. We have big ideas for the future.

Lammas Part Three - The Cob Nuts get to work

Tuesday saw us cob building in earnest. There was a cob greenhouse to work on and a timber frame building known as an Eco-pod.
The walls were made of cob, which is a mix of clay and sand. Often straw is added to give it strength. For the Eco-pod we were adding small amounts of lime. This helps to stabilise the cob, making it more weather-resistant, and also inhibits any fungal growth on the straw of the wood.

Chopping wood for the cordwood walls

The team making progress on the cordwood wall of the Ecopod

Both buildings were using cord wood as well as cob. Basically logs are placed across the wall and sandwiched together with cob. This means that faster progress can be made and a lot less cob is needed. For what I haven't yet told you about cob is that it is by far best to mix it with your feet!
It is hard work.

Traditionally it may well have been mixed by placing animals in enclosures filled with the mix ingredients. A little dung does no harm to the cob.

We only mixed one batch from scratch, taking the subsoil from existing heaps and adding in bought in clay. Where we live it would be the other way round, as our clay would need the addition of sand.

Mixing a clay 'slip' to be added to the subsoil

For the other batches, we were recycling a couple of old cob walls which had not fared well.
Cassie has learned about cob the hard way, by trying different mixes. Even if it has been built by volunteers, it must be desperately sad when all that hard work crumbles within a few years. One of the walls had apparently been mixed by digger, a short-cut too far, and one had been too thick at the base.
Personally I would rather do thorough research and learn by other people's mistakes, especially when so much hard work is involved.

I worked on the greenhouse that first day. Progress was very slow, especially round the window frames where we were using pure cob without the cordwood. The cob would do its best to sag too, so it was only really possible to build up about a foot at a time before leaving it overnight to settle.

While we were beavering away, we learned more about the community. It had been a difficult year with someone's house burning down (three years of hard work and commitment down the drain) followed by the drought.
But it did not sound as if the community was pulling together well either. There were hints at problems in committee (the usual story), obstinate individuals and those who just wanted to get on with things in isolation. This surprised me. The Ecovillage seemed more like nine disparate smallholdings. Yes, each smallholding was probably fulfilling the dreams of its occupants, but the community aspect seemed sadly lacking.
The same problems as afflict wider society seemed prevalent here too. This was a crying shame, as you would think that nine families with so much in common and such a similar set of beliefs and principles could be so much stronger than the sum of their parts.

More on the Lammas EcoVillage, how it started and how it works, in an upcoming post. More on the cob greenhouse idea too.

Lammas Part Two - A Gang Comes Together In The EcoVillage Hub

So, just to get a few things straight from the last post.
Much of the stuff about the hub kitchen, cooking and washing up for yourself etc, was due to an imminent inspection from a health official. While there was absolutely nothing wrong with the kitchen, you can imagine that a shared kitchen in an eco-village and a health inspector might not be a good mix.

Our host, Cassandra, quickly became Cassie. She was a warm, strong, knowledgeable and committed person, whose environmental principles were second to none. Cassie and her family shared their smallholding with us for five days.

The most notable element of this smallholding was the many low-impact buildings. Most were based on round timbers harvested from a patch of old spruce woodland. The roundhouses  (technical term: Reciprocal Roof Roundhouses) were amazing, either for human occupation, for animal shelter or for outdoor human shelters.

This delightful roundhouse is the family home until the proper ne is constructed. 

Something tells me that Cassie and Nigel are pretty happy in here though.

Reciprocal Roof Roundhouse constructed as an animal shelter.

You can see the slate foundation wall and the cordwood and cob walls.

Likewise the cob greenhouses, one of which was to be our main project for the week.

Before I talk about cob, a step back to our arrival at Lammas on the Monday. We weren't starting till 3pm, with a tour around and an explanation of hub kitchen rules (due to imminent health inspection as I found out).
I had been all ready to get going at 9 in the morning, but the pace of life here was slower. Instead Sue and I went into Aberteifi (Cardigan) for provisions before visiting a local waterfall.

By quarter to three there were only a few of us hanging around in the hub building, despite the rest needing to arrive and set up tents before we started. 

Gradually our fellow course participants and comrades for the week turned up. Three had plush camper vans, one other like us was using Air BnB. The last to arrive came at 3.30pm and proclaimed that they knew it would be ok to be late as 'these places are always disorganised'!!!! The fact that we were sat waiting for them seemed to go unnoticed.

The wonderful Hub, built to be the centre of the community

Everybody was very friendly though and from all walks of life. After the tour, Sue and I headed back to our studio cottage, not envying those who would be spending a week cob building (basically playing with mud) and trying to stay clean in a bucket shower with the hot water being heated on a gas ring.
Overall though, facilities were good.
Fresh spring water was in short supply and this in turn meant that there was no electricity. The recent drought, which has been exceptional but may well become a more regular pattern, had meant that the community's main source of electricity, a hydro scheme, was struggling.
I was surprised that there were not more back-up systems in place.

All in all though, I was warming to the place. Things may be a little disorganised, but maybe it is my fault for not being able to deal with that?

Lammas Part One - A Busman's Holiday

Once a year, thanks to a good friend who comes and looks after Swallow Farm and all its inhabitants for us, Sue and I get a week away together.
This year I had arranged to do a five day cob course at Lammas Eco Village in deepest West Wales, followed by a one day basket-making day. In between I planned to visit The Centre For Alternative technology, further North, which I last visited two years in a row when the University Green Society used to visit and do voluntary work - a few years back now!
This was to be a real busman's holiday.

Initial online impressions of the EcoVillage were mixed. Information on the web made some of the community seem a bit hippy trippy. I don't mind alternative trains of thought, I am hardly traditional myself. But I do think that such establishments set themselves up as an example of sustainable living. They are a little like high fashion, not particularly for everyone, but a high end example on which more regular folk can hang their ideas.

The village certainly seems to contain some pretty amazing self-builds, though one straw bale house did tragically suffer a serious fire not so long ago.

Originally Sue and I planned to camp in the village and use the community hub for our cooking etc. In the end I decided to book a little cottage just down the road - we are a little old for roughing it now.

Initial impressions are important, so I was a little hesitant when my first email 'disappeared'. But not all types are as technological as others - though funny how the same people manage to have Facebook pages, twitter accounts and websites.
Anyway, I went ahead and booked everything up.

Fast forward a few months and last week, just a few days before the actual course, we received a long email with further information. The 'provided lunch' had turned into 'an informal rota for preparing lunches' and the hub kitchen which 'has everything you will need' now has no electricity or hot water and 'bring your own plate, cup, bowl and cutlery' to avoid issues with washing up'. There would be thirteen of us (seems like a lot to share a bucket cold shower, a compost toilet and a couple of gas rings for cooking and heating water for washing up).
All of a sudden alarm bells were ringing. The eco-community seemed to be suffering a crisis of eco and a crisis of community. Sure, we have had a drought and growing has been difficult, but an exemplar eco village should not have energy systems which crumble due to just one adverse weather condition. We have, after all, had sunshine by the bucketload and wind energy should come fairly easily in Wales.
There was also a special note about privacy - 'many of the people here are very private...'. Now obviously we don't intend to go traipsing through everybody's houses and gardens or to gawp over the fences at them like zoo animals, but this community is suddenly starting to seem a bit fragile.

Smallholders can be a pretty antisocial bunch. By nature we are independent, determined (aka stubborn) and happy with our own company. But most of us don't choose to live in a specific eco-community.

And so the big day came. We said goodbye to the dogs - the first time we have both been away from them since we got them. We loaded up the car. Being dedicated smallholders, we did a last minute veg plot and freezer raid and loaded the car up with provisions.

The drive was a fairly long one and traffic was slow on the Midlands motorways as we passed through some protracted bad weather. Eventually though we were winding along some very small country lanes, up and down hills and valleys, a novelty for fenlanders, and we pulled up at our self-catering studio cottage. It was delightful and very well appointed. We quickly set about making the place feel like home.

ed - lots of post-production edits at the moment as I am now back from what turned out to be a truly inspiring and re-invigorating holiday. First impressions were wrong.

All will be revealed in the next post.