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GREEN IDEAS & recommendations for transition towards a more resilient world

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JUDE STEELE Collaborative: MATTHEW LOHDEN • JUDE STEELE • AJ LANDON • SANDY LANDO lohdensteele.com • also see premieredesigners.com for more ... HOW CAN WE ECO TRANSITION towards a less consuming lifestyle? If you hold the view that consumption, climate change or peak oil requires that we develop new ways to rebuild our resiliences, we hope these visualizations of how we can move in this direction help inspire you to take action. Here are examples and resources we as designerʼs and builders vision as positive models for exploring promising resilience in design and building. Although we will focus primarily on creating beautiful and efficient LIVE+WORK+PLAY environments, many parameters must be considered to design real green solutions. This goes beyond changing light bulbs and buying ʻgreenʼ stuff. Landfills are still filling up with many ʻgreenʼ products because they are not made to last as long our grandmotherʼs

armoire and those ﬂuorescent lights can leach mercury into our water table. We need to make real informed and responsible choices that go beyond looking ʻgreenʼ to impress our friends. To design and build toward becoming more responsive to our times a whole view approach is required that includes rethinking food, farming, health, medicine, transport, water, energy, education, economy, politics, community building and relocalization. We must ask ourselves what structures, skills, and resources we need to scale down our natural resource consumptions. How do we make this an inspiring vision that will motivate us to passionately pursue our dreams? A picture that touches our hearts, minds, and soul. Perhaps we can rebuild our life patterns into the

transition model by aspiring to LIVE+WORK+PLAY while making ART, GARDENS, and BEAUTY in our communities. Can we learn anything useful from our history and present? How have others passionately pursued their dreams and ideals and created resilience? Were our visions of abundance in the past useful? Then we knew where our food, furniture and clothing came from and we often who made it? How can the Transition approach in design and building combined with the our passions for making beauty inspire us to make wise choices with lasting positive affects. How can we create such enthusiasm that our concepts go viral and we step up to the inevitable conclusion that wiser planning is required for resilience to grow?

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ON • JACKI ALLEN • ANN SHOGREN DESIGN GROUP • FERNANDA VIELLEUMIER +MORE “Many of us are seeking deeper sources of satisfaction than are being offered by a high stress, consumption-obsessed society. While our incomes have risen the percentage of the population reporting they are very happy has remained unchanged (roughly 1/3) and, yet divorce rates have doubled and teen suicide rates have tripled. A whole generation has tasted the fruits of an afﬂuent society and has discovered that money does not buy happiness. In the search for satisfaction, millions of people are not only “downshifting” or pulling back from the rat race, they are also “upshifting” or moving ahead into a life that is, though materially more modest, rich with family, friends, community, creative work in the world, and a soulful connection with the universe.” Duane Elgin, author of Voluntary Simplicity

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Table of Contents INTRODUCTION: Here are ideas, images, products and choices available that we believe should be considered and studied for transitioning into a more eco friendly lifestyle with less consumption. Many of these ideas and sources are from others and we have tried to link these and credit. In these times we feel copyrighting and hoarding information for ﬁnancail gain seems counterproductive. We must transform our environments into natural, functional, artistic spaces that support health and well being. There are many viewpoint about how to do this. Our position is that many choices are available and we need not compromise luxury and comfort when this is a personal priority. People will change more when the are inspired to thrive in a better world. Whether living, working or playing, quality DESIGN & PLANNING is required to live well now and into a resilient SUSTAINABLE future.Weʼll continue adding more information to this collection. How Change to “Voluntary Simply“ can be BEAUTIFUL”...................................... 6 GREEN ROOFS & Rooftop Gardens...................................................................21 SIMPLICITY PRIMER .........................................................................................33 Can PERMACULTURE assist us in Eco Transition?

perma(nent)+(agri)culture Permanent Culture....38

NATURAL Swimming Pools.................................................................................48 12 Key Steps to embarking on your ECO transition journey.................................58 Eco Friendly Traditional & Modern Kitchens.......................................................74 Can Good Design Create Happiness? ..............................................................94 Bring in Nature with Photography....................................................................104 VILLA DONA...Live+Work+Play ECO home+ofﬁce............................................112 Book time on our private island in Belize....SUPPORT ECO PROJECTS...................114

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How Change to Voluntary Simply can be Beautiful Excerpts from The Garden Of Simplicity By Duane Elgin, author of Voluntary Simplicity Buy this book at www.awakeningearth.org/

Simplicity of living is not a new idea. It has deep roots in history and ﬁnds expression in all of the worldʼs wisdom traditions. More than two thousand years ago, in the same historical period that Christians were saying “Give me neither poverty nor wealth,” (Proverbs 30:8), the Taoists were asserting “He who knows he has enough is rich” (Lao Tzu), Plato and Aristotle were proclaiming the importance of the “golden mean” of a path through life with neither excess nor deﬁcit, and the Buddhists were encouraging a “middle way” between poverty and mindless accumulation. Clearly, the simple life is not a new social invention. What is new are the radically changing ecological, social, and psycho-spiritual circumstances of the modern world. The push toward simpler ways of living was clearly described in 1992 when over 1,600 of the worldʼs senior scientists, including a majority of the living Nobel laureates in the sciences, signed an unprecedented “Warning to Humanity.” In this historic statement, they declared that, “human beings and the natural world are on a collision course . . . that may so alter the living world that it will be unable to sustain life in the manner that we know.” They concluded that: “A great change in our stewardship of the earth and the life on it is required, if vast human misery is to be avoided and our global home on this planet is not to be irretrievably mutilated.” Roughly a decade later came a related warning from 100 Nobel Prize winners who said that “The most profound danger to world peace in the coming years will stem not from the irrational acts of states or individuals but form the legitimate demands of the worldʼs dispossessed.” As these two warnings by the worldʼs elder scientists indicate, powerful adversity trends (such as global climate change, the depletion of key resources such as water and cheap oil, a burgeoning population, and a growing gap between the rich and poor) are converging into a whole-systems crisis, creating the possibility of an evolutionary crash within this generation. If we are to create instead an evolutionary bounce or leap forward, it will surely include a shift toward simpler, more sustainable and satisfying ways of living.

Simplicity is the new mantra for the overworked, overstressed, and overcluttered, and for those who want to lighten their impact on the Earth. Whatever your resources it is possible to live in beauty. The author of the classic book on voluntary simplicity says the ways to simplicity are many ... Choiceful Simplicity and living Artfully means choosing our path through life consciously and deliberately. As a path that emphasizes freedom, simplicity also means staying focused, diving deep, and not being distracted by consumer culture. It means consciously organizing our lives so we give our true gifts to the world.

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In response to the unique pushes and pulls of modern conditions, in the United States and a dozen or so other “postmodern” nations, a trend toward simpler living has evolved from a fringe movement in the 1960s to a respected part of the mainstream culture in the 2000s. Now glossy magazines tout the simple life from the newsstands across the U.S. while it has become a popular theme on major television talk shows. Surveys show a distinct subpopulation -- conservatively estimated at 10 percent of the U.S. adult population or 20 million people -- is pioneering a way of life that is outwardly more sustainable and inwardly more spiritual. Importantly, the simple life is not simple. Many, diverse expressions of simplicity of living are flowering in response to the challenges and opportunities of our times. To present a more realistic picture of the scope and expression of this way of life for todayʼs complex world, here are ten different approaches that I see thriving in a “garden of simplicity. “ Although there is overlap among them, each expression of simplicity seems sufficiently distinct to warrant a separate category. So there would be no favoritism in listing, they are placed in alphabetical order based on the brief name I associated with each. 1. Choiceful Simplicity: Simplicity means choosing our path through life consciously, deliberately, and of our own accord. As a path that emphasizes freedom, a choiceful simplicity also means staying focused, diving deep, and not being distracted by consumer culture. It means consciously organizing our lives so that we give our “true gifts” to the world -- which is to give the essence of ourselves. As Emerson said, “The only true gift is a portion of yourself.” 2. Commercial Simplicity: Simplicity means there is a rapidly growing market for healthy and sustainable products and services of all kinds -- from home-building materials and energy systems to foods. When the need for a sustainable infrastructure in developing nations is combined with the need to retrofit and redesign the homes, cities, workplaces, and transportation systems of “developed” nations, then it is clear that an enormous expansion of highly purposeful economic activity will unfold with a shift toward sustainability. 3. Compassionate Simplicity: Simplicity means to feel such a sense of kinship with others that we “choose to live simply so that others may simply live.” A compassionate simplicity means feeling a bond with the community of life and drawn toward a path of reconciliation -- with other species and future generations as well as, for example, between those with great differences of wealth and opportunity. A compassionate simplicity is a path of cooperation and fairness that seeks a future of mutually assured development for all. 4. Ecological Simplicity: Simplicity means to choose ways of living that touch the Earth more lightly and that reduce our ecological footprint. An ecological simplicity appreciates our deep interconnection with the web

A quiet revolution in living has been underway for the past few decades in which as much as a quarter of the adult population has made signiﬁcant changes toward simpler ways of living. This article describes ten diﬀerent approaches that are thriving. Learn more by buying these books and reading Dueane Elgin interviews.

The Garden Of Simplicity Choosing A New Lifeway: Voluntary Simplicity Voluntary Simplicity new addition coming Jan 2010

www.awakeningearth. org/articles

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is mobilized by threats to its well-being (such as climate change, species-extinction, and resource depletion). It also fosters “natural capitalism” or economic practices that value the importance of natural eco-systems and healthy people for a productive economy, from local to global. 5. Elegant Simplicity: Simplicity means that the way we live our lives represents a work of unfolding artistry. As Gandhi said, “My life is my message.” In this spirit, an elegant simplicity is an understated, organic aesthetic that contrasts with the excess of consumerist lifestyles. Drawing from influences ranging from Zen to the Quakers, it celebrates natural materials and clean, functional expressions, such as are found in many of the hand-made arts and crafts from this community. 6. Frugal Simplicity: Simplicity means that, by cutting back on spending that is not truly serving our lives, and by practicing skillful management of our personal finances, we can achieve greater financial independence. Frugality and careful financial management bring increased financial freedom and the opportunity to more consciously choose our path through life. Living with less also decreases the impact of our consumption upon the Earth and frees resources for others. 7. Natural Simplicity: Simplicity means to remember our deep roots in the natural world. It means to experience our connection with the ecology of life in which we are immersed and to balance our experience of the human-created environments with time in nature. It also means to celebrate the experience of living through the miracle of the Earthʼs seasons. A natural simplicity feels a deep reverence for the community of life on Earth and accepts that the non-human realms of plants and animals have their dignity and rights as well the human. 8. Political Simplicity: Simplicity means organizing our collective lives in ways that enable us to live more lightly and sustainably on the Earth which, in turn, involves changes in nearly every area of public life -- from transportation and education to the design of our homes, cities, and workplaces. The politics of

Vernacular Water Courtyard Sri Lanka

How Change to Voluntary Simply can be Beautiful Published to that date by the program and it stirred national interest in the theme of simplicity. This article is an updated version of that catalytic report and was published in the Summer, 1977 issue of the Co-Evolution Quarterly (which, in turn, was published by the Whole Earth Catalog).

Voluntary Simplicity is a name which denotes a social movement of great diversity and richness. Not surprisingly, there are many values congruent with voluntary simplicity — that radiate out, so to speak, touching global as well as close-to-home issues, idealistic as well as practical matters, and worldly along with personal concerns. Yet, there seems to be an underlying coherence to the rich diversity of expression of this way of life. Consequently, we have selected a skeletal list of those values, which seem to us to lie at the heart of this emerging way of life. These five values are the following: • Material Simplicity • Human Scale • Self-Determination • Ecological Awareness • Personal Growth These are considered in detail below. 1. Material Simplicity Simplification of the material aspects of life is one of the core values of voluntary simplicity. The American Friends Service Committee, long a leader in exploring a way of life of creative simplicity, defines simple living as a “non-consumerist lifestyle based upon being and becoming, not having.” The Friends have identified four consumption criteria which evoke the essence of voluntary material simplicity: • • • •

Does what I own or buy promote activity, self-reliance, and involvement, or does it induce passivity and dependence? Are my consumption patters basically satisfying, or do I buy much that serves no real need? How tied are my present job and lifestyle to installment payments, maintenance and repair costs, and the expectations of others? Do I consider the impact of my consumption patterns

on other people and on the earth? These consumption criteria imply an intention to “reduce frills and luxuries in our present lifestyle but at the same time emphasize the beauty and joy of living.” They are designed to (1) help people lead lives of creative simplicity, freed from excessive attachment to material goods; (2) aid the nation release more of its wealth to share with those who presently do not have even the basic necessities of life; (3) help individuals become more self-sufﬁcient and less dependent upon large, complex institutions, whether public or private; and (4) restore to life a sense of proportion and balance between the material and nonmaterial aspects of living.

photograph by Polly Wreford

Although living simply implies consuming quantitatively less (particularly items that are energy inefﬁcient, nonbiodegradable, nonessential luxuries, etc.), this does not mean that the overall cost of consumption will go down drastically. Living simply need not be equated with living cheaply. The hand crafted, durable, esthetically enduring products that appeal to frugal consumers are oftentimes purchased at a considerable premium over mass-produced items. Therefore, although the quantity of consumption may decrease and the environmental costs of consumption may be considerably moderated, the overall cost of consumption may remain relatively high since our economy is not oriented to producing the kinds of products which ﬁt these criteria. Material simplicity will thus

likely be manifest in consumption styles that are less ascetic (of strictly enforced austerity) and more aesthetic (where each person will consider whether his or her level and pattern of consumption fits, with grace and integrity, into the practical art of daily living). In this view, material possessions are supportive of rather than central to, the process of human growth. Since the ways of expressing that growth are diverse, it seems likely that the degree and nature of material simplification will be a matter for each individual to settle largely for him or herself. 2. Human Scale A preference for human-sized living and working environments is a central feature of the values constellation embraced by voluntary simplicity. Adherents to voluntary simplicity tend to equate the gigantic scale of institutions and living environments with anonymity, incomprehensibility, and artificiality. In contrast, as E.F. Schumacher has so powerfully stated, “Small is Beautiful.” The smallness theme touches on many facets of living. It implies that living and working environments as well as supportive institutions (which have grown to enormous levels of scale and complexity) should, whenever possible, be decentralized into more comprehensible and manageable entities. This further implies that peopleʼs endeavors should be of such dimensions that each knows what he/she contributes to the whole and, hence, has a sense of shared rewards and shared responsibility. Reduction of scale is seen as a means of getting back to basics by restoring to life a more human sense of proportion and perspective. 3. Self-Determination Voluntary simplicity embraces an intention to be more self-determining and less dependent upon large, complex institutions whether in the private sector (the economy) or public sector (the political processes). Selfdetermination manifests itself in consumption as a desire to assume greater control over oneʼs personal destiny and not lead a life so tied to “installment payments, maintenance costs and the expectations of others.” To counterbalance the trend towards increasing material dependency a person may seek to become more materially self-sufficient — to grow his own, to make his own, to do without, and to exercise self-discipline in his pattern and level of consumption so that the degree of dependency (both physical and psychological) is reduced. Self-determination shows up in production as a counterbalancing force to combat excessive division of labor. Therefore, instead of embracing specialization the adherent to voluntary simplicity may seek greater work integration and synthesis so that the relationship between his work and its contribution to the whole is more evident. In the public sector, the drive for greater self-determination is revealed by a growing distrust of and sense of alienation from large and complex social bureaucracies. The individual — particularly the adherent to voluntary simplicity

Simplicity choices have already lasted for generations Antiques, Classic Homes, Farms, & Memories.

— seems to want to take charge of his life more fully and to manage his own affairs without the undue or unnecessary intrusion of a remote bureaucracy. This dimension of voluntary simplicity may explain some of the unusual political coalitions that seem to be emerging between the right and left — where neither support the further intrusion of big institutions into their lives, but rather wish for greater local self-determination and grass roots political action. This aversion to being controlled by increasingly distant bureaucracies is reminiscent of the stubborn independence out of which was born the American Revolution. 4. Ecological Awareness A sense of ecological awareness which acknowledges the interconnectedness and interdependence of people and resources is central to voluntary simplicity. There emerges from this awareness a number of themes that are hallmarks of this way of life. For example, ecological awareness prompts recognition that our earth is indeed limited, with all that implies for conservation of physical resources, reduction of environmental pollution, and maintenance of the beauty and integrity of the natural environment. Importantly, this awareness often seems to extend beyond a concern for purely physical resources to include other human beings as well. The philosophy of “welfare” espoused by Gandhi (sarvodaya — not wanting what the least of the inhabitants of this earth cannot have) seems to bring, in substantial part, from this intimate sense of felt connection with those who are less fortunate than we. From this awareness there may arise a sense of compassion and caring that extends beyond the boundaries of the nation-state to include all of humankind. In acknowledging the underlying unity of the human race, the growth of an ecological awareness expands the vision of voluntary simplicity outward and brings with it a strong sense of social responsibility and worldly involvement to what otherwise could be a relatively isolated and self-centered way of life.

architect Preston Scott Cohen

architect Rita Huys environmental designer Jude Steele

Some of the more concrete expressions of this awareness might include: a willingness to share resources with those who are disadvantaged; a sense of global citizenship with commensurate adjustments in lifestyle, social vision, and political commitments; a preference for living where there is ready access to nature; and a desire to foster human and institutional diversity at a grass roots level. 5. Personal Growth For many persons taking up a materially simple way of life, the primary reason is to clear away external clutter so as to be freer to explore the “inner life.” The themes of material simplicity, self-sufﬁciency, a more human scale to living and working, and an ecological awareness are, in a way, devices to sweep away impediments to inner growth. The goal, then, is to free oneself of the overwhelming externals so as to provide the space in which to grow — both psychologically and spiritually. Simone de Beauvoir succinctly stated the rationale for this desire for self-realization when she said: “Life is occupied in both perpetuating itself and in surpassing itself; if all it does is maintain itself, then living is only not dying.” From the vantage point of many adherents to

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Vernacular Courtyard Hacienda, Chile

voluntary simplicity, contemporary American society is primarily occupied in perpetuating itself — and living has become “only not dying.” As the workability and meaning of traditional values and goals becomes less compelling, a small but rapidly growing number of Americans have become intensively engaged in the attempt to surpass themselves. Although personal growth often includes a distinctly spiritual aspect, involvement with the inner/nonmaterial dimension of life should not be associated with any particular philosophy or religion — its scope embraces activities ranging from biofeedback, humanistic psychology, transpersonal psychology, Eastern philosophy, fundamentalist Christianity, and more. A concern for the subjective aspect of experience and for the quality of human relationships has been reflected in a steady current of evolving social trends over the past 15 years. Developments have included the emergence and proliferation of the “human potential movement;” the emergence of “transpersonal psychology” coupled with a rapid increase of interest and involvement in many Eastern meditative traditions; the growth of feminism; a cultural fascination with psychic phenomena; developments in brain research that confirm a biological basis for both the rational and the intuitive side to human nature; a growing interest in sports as both a physical and spiritual process (e.g., the “inner game” of tennis); and more. Without the compelling goal of exploring inner potentials, it seems unlikely that there will be sufficient motivation to adopt voluntarily a way of life of material simplicity. Without greater simplicity, it seems unlikely that we will be able to cope successfully with the problems engendered, for example, by scarcity. Finally, unless inner learning expands, it seems unlikely there will develop the degree of internal maturation necessary for the human species to act as wise trustees of conscious evolution on this earth. Still, this analysis does not penetrate to the roots of the connection between personal growth and voluntary simplicity. To explain adequately, we must look to a deeper underlying vision. It is an old vision — perhaps as old as civilized man — but an enduring one that seems destined to be rediscovered again and again. The nature of this vision is succinctly summed up by the eminent historian, Arnold Toynbee: These religious founders [Jesus, Buddha, Lao Tse, St. Francis of Assisi] disagreed with each other in their pictures of what is the nature of the universe, the nature of spiritual life, the nature of ultimate spiritual reality. But they all agreed in their ethical precepts. They all agreed that the pursuit of material wealth is a wrong aim. We should aim only at the minimum wealth needed to maintain life; and our main aim should be spiritual. They all said with one voice that if we made material wealth our paramount aim, this would lead to disaster. They all spoke in favor of unselfishness and of love for other people as the key to happiness

Green Roofs & Rooftop Gardens as they are called, deﬁnitely add worth to the house. Besides adding an aesthetic value to the house it also gives an opportunity to ‘grow your own’ green vegetables and at the same time expands your personal space. Your roof garden will also insulate your building thereby, reducing your electricity bills.

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s rooftop garden urban residence designer, Jude Steele Wash DC

and to success in human affairs. The foregoing five themes do not exhaust the range of basic values that may emerge as hallmarks of the way of life termed voluntary simplicity. Moreover, these values will surely be held to differing degrees in differing combinations by different people. Nonetheless, these values possess an underlying coherence which suggests that they have not arisen randomly but rather as a strongly reinforcing set or pattern. Just a few moments of reflection reveals how powerfully reinforcing these values are: for example, personal growth may foster an ecological awareness which may prompt greater material simplicity and thereby allow greater opportunity for living and working at a smaller, more human scale which, in turn, may allow greater opportunity for local self-determination. No one value theme alone could create the vitality and coherence that emerges from the synergistic interaction of these values. To the extent that these values provide people with a realistic basis for both maintaining and surpassing themselves, they then constitute a practical “world view” — a coherent pattern of perception, belief, and behavior which could provide an important bridge between the traditional industrial world view and an uncertain and difficult social future.

What Voluntary Simplicity Is Not We have been trying to deﬁne what voluntary simplicity is. We can also get a sense of voluntary simplicity by suggesting what it is not. • Voluntary simplicity should not be equated with a backto-nature movement. Although an historic shift in net population migration towards small towns and rural places is underway, the large majority of people continue to reside in urban environments. Voluntary simplicity seems perhaps as compelling for this urban majority as it does for the rural minority. An urban existence need not be incompatible with voluntary simplicity; indeed, many of the experiments with appropriate technology, intensive gardening, and such have been conducted in urban contexts. • Although voluntary simplicity surely traces some of its contemporary heritage and vitality to the counterculture movement of the 1960s, its present constituency is certainly not limited to that group. Many of its adherents are of an age and background far removed from the proponents of the so-called “new values” a decade ago. • Voluntary simplicity should not be equated with living in poverty. Indeed, impoverishment is in many ways the opposite of simple living in that poverty tends to make life a struggle to maintain oneself and provides little opportunity to surpass oneself. • Voluntary simplicity is not a social panacea. It does imply social evolution towards what its adherents view as the minimal requirements for long term global survival but that does not itself cure the problems we

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Jude Steele Collaborative: Bringing viewpoints that go beyond the box to embrace your ideas and compliment the natural environment. Listening carefully to help make environments that reflect clients’ specific aspirations. Places that are celebrations of our client’s tastes, budgets and preferences. Providing practical and creative design, construction and design management in collaboration with other design professionals, builders and artists. Blending classical and contemporary design and the people and resources needed to create special places in a variety of scales including: schools, businesses, stores, homes, rooms, furnishings, gardens and artworks. Offering fresh perspectives and resources with Green practices that support our sustainable global and local community with simple straight forward solutions. Jude Steele and her collaborative team assists you in defining your vision indoors or out. An opportunity to make spaces a source of imagination and delight. Because we all want to LIVE+WORK+PLAY well. Collaborating with our team on your project is an insightful journey into the rewards of DESIGN, BIM/CAD, MODELING, BUILDING & ART MAKING with a staff ready to support your vision as we transition toward a more efficient, sustainable & resilient world! This dream team offers a level of BIM & CAD modeling & DESIGN access difficult to find in most firms integrated with quality design, project management, & GREEN SOLUTIONS.

confront; rather, voluntary simplicity may provide a basis from which societal responses with some long term hope for success can emerge. • It is not a movement with heart but without the skills necessary to bring it to fruition. Among those who adhere to many of the tenets of voluntary simplicity are, in our estimation, some of the most creative and capable intellects, artists, and humanistic capitalists in the United States. Voluntary simplicity draws its ranks substantially from the well-educated, and, as such, has access to a rich pool of talent. • Voluntary simplicity is not a social movement confined to the United States. Virtually all of the developed Western nations seem to be moving in a somewhat similar direction (although its expression may be altered by the cultural context and social experience). Many European nations, with more limited land and resources, have been learning how to cope with scarcity for far longer than the United States has. And there is evidence that other nations may be opting for voluntary simplicity rather than endure the stress of striving for affluence. For example, a recent poll in Norway found that “74 percent of the total sample claimed they would prefer a simple life with no more than essentials (these were, however, not defined) to a high income and many material benefits if these have to be obtained through increased stress.” • • Voluntary simplicity is not a fad. Its roots reach far too deeply into the needs and ideals of people everywhere to be regarded as a transitory response to a passing societal condition. The Push Toward Voluntary Simplicity We have suggested that there is a strong pull towards voluntary simplicity. It seems to offer a practical, workable, and meaningful way of life for a small but significant segment of the population. Yet, despite the strength of this pull to voluntary simplicity, there is little reason to think that this way of life will grow to embrace substantial proportions of the population unless the pull is matched by substantial pushes. These twin elements of push and pull need to be considered if we are to assess the likelihood that voluntary simplicity will gather social momentum in the future. We turn, then, to consideration of whether society problems will push us in a direction similar to that exerted by the pull toward voluntary simplicity. The range and diversity of contemporary societal problems is enormous. Space does not allow more than a cursory glance at some of the more prominent problems which may, in their eventual resolution, push us towards a simple way of life. These problems include: • The prospect of running out of cheaply available, critical, industrial raw materials • The prospect of chronic energy shortages and a difficult transition to a much more energy-efficient economy

ROOF GARDEN TIPS 1) Involve an architect so the planning is done properly, like the kind of materials that should be used. and whether the structure can take the weight of the roof garden or not. 2) Even if the structure can take the weight, use the least weight possible. Check the roof for leaks. 3) Provide the roof with a water proof membrane to protect the structure from leaks. 4) Provide a root barrier to prevent the roots from entering the membrane. 5) Provision for drainage layer needs to be in place, usually made of gravel and light weight plastic. 6) For containers use only plastic, ﬁberglass or foam and for soil, use lightweight planting soil. If you will not use pavers that will also cut the amount of weight.

Rooftop Gardens

Tips for Rooftop Gardening • Mulch everything. • Water deeply and often • Choose vegetables that suit the environment • Use compost tea and green manures to ammend the soil • Attempt to create shade, with trellises for example • If you donʼt have the means for an intensive rooftop garden consider using containers.

• The growing threat that before we run out of material resources in any absolute sense we will pollute ourselves to death with the intrusion of many thousands of hazardous substances into our living environments and food chains • Rising material demands of the third and fourth world, coupled with climatic changes which may induce periodic but massive famine in certain areas, coupled with the growing threat of terrorism (conventional, nuclear, biological), coupled with the growing vulnerability of the highly complex and interdependent technology (e.g., communications, energy, and transportation systems) common to developed nations • The changing balance of global power, given rapid nuclear proliferation • The poverty of abundance — growing dissatisfaction with the output of our industrial society as the sole or even primary reward and reason for our individual existences • Challenge to the legitimacy of leaders in nearly all major institutions — both public and private • Apparent loss of social purpose and direction coupled with rising levels of individual alienation • Chronic and pervasive fiscal crises of many of our largest cities, coupled with an historic and unexpected turnaround in migration patterns (the net flow is now to small towns and rural areas) • Decline in the expected number of meaningful work roles, coupled with growing levels of automation, coupled with chronic underemployment and unemployment • The prospect that we have created social bureaucracies (at the federal, state, and local levels) of such extreme levels of scale, complexity, and interdependence that they now exceed our capacity to comprehend and, therefore, to manage them; coupled with growing protests that we are becoming an excessively overregulated society, coupled with growing demands upon government at all levels • Growing demands that domestic economic inequities be moderated, coupled with the prospect of a little- or no-growth economy in the foreseeable future, yielding the spectre of intense competition for a fixed or slowly growing pie

7) Now, plan the kind of plants that you need in your garden. Whether you want It to be a vegetable, herb, flower or all combined into one garden. This planning depends on your needs and secondly, on the space available, if the space is large you can plant everything in sufficient quantity. 8) If regulations and the weight requirements permit, you can also add water features to enhance your roof garden. 9) Watering system needs to be in place to water the plants, as you cannot run up and down with buckets full of water. 10) Use windbreakers to decrease the flow of wind on your roof. 11) Fences for safety are a must in such development. 12) If you are the kinds who do not have enough time to take care of the plants, then use the plants that need less care such as succulents or cactus. 13) If you do not have the time to do anything elaborate than all you can do is add some pots here and there. 16) If the space allows, you can add another dimension to your living space by just adding stylish furniture to your garden. by Priyanka Ohri | Jul 28 2009

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Resolution of problems such as these will likely push our society in a direction which is more ecologically conscious, more frugal in its consumption, more globally oriented, more decentralized, more allowing of local self-determination, and so on. To some considerable extent, it appears that resolution of these increasingly serious problems will push in a direction at least similar to that implied by the pull toward voluntary simplicity.

II. Patterns & Dimensions Of Voluntary Simplicity We think there are at least two very distinct kinds of people fully living the VS way of life. The first, and less numerous of the two, consists of a heterogeneous group of families and individuals who have voluntarily taken up simple living following years or decades of active involvement in the mainstream. The motivations of such people tend to be highly private and specific — desire to escape the “rat race,” personal disillusionment, boredom with the job, the desire to live a less plastic life, and so on. Such changes in lifestyle make good copy and hence this type of phenomenon gets much publicity. In terms of numbers, this group does not appear very significant. However, as a model for others to emulate, this group may be profoundly important. The other type tends to be younger, more motivated by philosophical concerns, more activistic, and more given to promoting the VS view. Since no survey has yet been made explicitly for the purpose of defining the demographics of adherents to VS, we are forced to surmise their characteristics based on the attributes of related groups (such as environmentalists, consumerists, members of “human potential” movements, those operating Briarpatch businesses, etc.) on which some data are available. Based on this kind of inferential evidence, the second group of adherents to voluntary simplicity appears to be: • • • • • •

Predominantly young, the large majority being in their 20s or 30s Evenly divided among the sexes Preponderantly single, although many young families are included Almost exclusively white From middle or upper class backgrounds Exceptionally well educated

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Simplicity is also a media politics as the mass media are the primary vehicle for reinforcing -- or transforming -- the mass consciousness of consumerism. Political simplicity is a politics of conversations and community that builds from local, face-to-face connections to networks of relationships emerging around the world through the enabling power of television and the Internet. 9. Soulful Simplicity: Simplicity means to approach life as a meditation and to cultivate our experience of intimate connection with all that exists. A spiritual presence infuses the world and, by living simply, we can more directly awaken to the living universe that surrounds and sustains us, moment by moment. Soulful simplicity is more concerned with consciously tasting life in its unadorned richness than with a particular standard or manner of material living. In cultivating a soulful connection with life, we tend to look beyond surface appearances and bring our interior aliveness into relationships of all kinds. 10. Uncluttered Simplicity: Simplicity means taking charge of a life that is too busy, too stressed, and too fragmented. An uncluttered simplicity means cutting back on trivial distractions, both material and non-material, and focusing on the essentials -- whatever those may be for each of our unique lives. As Thoreau said, “Our life is frittered away by detail... Simplify, simplify.” Or, as Plato wrote, “In order to seek oneʼs own direction, one must simplify the mechanics of ordinary, everyday life.” As these ten approaches illustrate, the growing culture of simplicity contains a ﬂourishing garden of expressions whose great diversity -- and intertwined unity -- are creating a resilient and hardy ecology of learning about how to live more sustainable and meaningful lives. As with other ecosystems, it is the diversity of expressions that fosters ﬂexibility, adaptability, and resilience. Because there are so many pathways of great relevance into the garden of simplicity, this cultural movement appears to have enormous potential to grow -- particularly if it is nurtured and cultivated in the mass media as a legitimate, creative, and promising life-path for the future. Our evolutionary intelligence is now being tested. The choices made within this generation will reverberate into the deep future. Although human societies have confronted major hurdles throughout history, the challenges of our era are genuinely unique. Never before have so many people been called upon to make such sweeping changes in so little time. Never before has the entire human family been entrusted with the task of working together to imagine and then consciously build a sustainable, just, and compassionate future. Seeds growing for the past generation in the garden of simplicity are now blossoming into the springtime of their relevance for the Earth. May the garden thrive.

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To read more by Duane Elgin, author of Voluntary Simplicity & Arnold Mitchell see this website & buy their books: w w w. s i m p l e l i v i n g . n e t / c o n t e n t / custom_voluntary_simplicity_part_ 2.asp & awakeningearth.org

Voluntary Simplicity â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Part 2 IV. Future Social Implications Alternative Futures: 1. Technological Salvation Chaos 2. Descent Into Social 3. Benign Authoritarianism 4. HumanisticTransformation V. Business Implications VI. Conclusions A newly revised and updated edition of Voluntary Simplicity was bublished on Jan. 1, 2210. Elgin articulates an operating manual of hossibility and hope. Also see his book The Living Universe which explores a paradigm that is vital for building a sustainable future; namely, a shift from regardin the universe as fragmented and dead to seeing it as uniďŹ ed and alive. ORDER the paperback from these sites: Berrett-Koehler Publishers or The Simple Living Network

Simplicity Primer by Chenista Rae Straubel You know that you have grown up when all the rules are gone and you canʼt remember what game you were playing. Suddenly you realize that it wasnʼt a game, it was for real. You begin to wonder what it all means and why it should mean anything at all. Volunteer Simplicity demands nothing and expects nothing. All demands and expectations are born within you. If you expect that you should be this or that, an environmental activist or involved in volunteer simplicity, then you are probably not ready for true volunteer simplicity. The very notion of an expectation or demand assumes “burden” and you are not living consciously if you live with burdens. Burdens weigh a spirit down - simplicity is uplifting - it frees you from both your internal limitations and outer shell of expectations and demands. You live simply because you want to. Simplicity is not a social cult. Much like all things, simplicity just is. Likewise, if you expect something from volunteer simplicity, then you are not ready for simplicity. Simplicity is without expectations. Simplicity is living in abundance within spirit, consciously experiencing

all moments of life without taking or expecting anything from the moment. All moments stay where they are, what is you carry is but a mere experience, an opportunity to awaken and to share in new ways. You live purposefully and with respect. “You Must Be Present to Win” Simplicity is neither acting nor reacting. In simplicity, you are present within the moment. You are not weighted by the past or in anticipation of future gains; all experiences and present only within the moment that is happening, letting go of each moment as it passes uplifts you to a higher love, consciousness or awareness. Simplicity is living at peace within your self and with all things that live peace within. You neither take life from, nor sacriﬁce for life... your actions are purposeful and for the mere of intent of doing without expectations of rewards or demands of life. Simplicity is living esoteric truths. Unfortunately, our society conveys that it is more honorable to consume than it is to be frugal - to discard and purchase new. This creates a vicious cycle of buy, consume, discard - buy, consume, discard without taking into consideration the childhood rule, common sense, "Take only what you need, use what you take, share, and take

care of your belongings." All of this may seem good for the economy, but is it good environmentally. If the cycle is not balanced, then it is not simple - and partaking creates complications. Breaking the cycle is living simply. Moments of Truth Living simply does not mean that you canʼt own an electric can opener, a dishwasher, washing machine, clothes dryer, or anything else. If the purchase complicates your life with problems that canʼt be resolved, then it is not living simply. For instance, you second mortgage your home to buy an expensive car. Now you have to work two jobs to pay for both. This purchase just complicated your life; therefore, you are not living simply. Wanting that expensive car is not living simply as well - for in simplicity, there are no demands, expectations, or wants - all imply a burden and therefore, remove your presence from the experiences of the moment. In essence, if the decision complicates your life or removes your attention from the experience of the moment, then you are not living simply. If you feel burdened by this thought - you are not ready for simplicity.

Simplicity is fully experiencing your own moments of truths.

Unveiling Just like a seed, often we have to be so disillusioned by our present condition that we are ready to risk all, totally surrender, for the sake of ﬁnding something better. This is the seed of conscious truth - we truly know who we are and what our purpose is. This is Volunteer Simplicity and we blossom in to a new reality, conscious of our presence within all moments.

Degrees of signiﬁcance are products of ego assigning superiority and inferiority to people, places and elements. In simplicity, everything has a purpose and therefore, nothing is insigniﬁcant.

Our life takes on a special meaning and we lay the plan to a greater and more rewarding life - spiritual rewards, invigorated by the experience of living.

You have reached a milestone in the journey of simplicity when you give up your need to always be right and the struggles born from that need.

We may come to realize that as we experience we give life to our spirit and out spirit returns the experience to us. We are not separate, but totally integrated - not complicated, but very simple. We are here to give experience to our spirit who experiences the human condition though us and only though us. Simplicity bridges the distance between spirit and self and experiences the unity of all things living in peaceful coexistence. You see yourself not as a separate entity with the trees, sky, grass, yes - even dirt, but a vital part of these elements acknowledging that all was born of the same single substance.Simplicity is nurtured by the continuous connection with all things brave, beautiful and small. Nothing is insigniﬁcant in simplicity - as every thing has the purpose of experiencing life in the present incarnation whether it is as a tree, butterﬂy, or whatever.

Simplicity is a breath of fresh air the freedom of a butterﬂy to just “be still”.

Simplicity is nurtured by the innocence of not knowing and is always open to knowing.

Flow: Optimal Experience Life takes on certain syncopation as you become attuned to a natural clock - flowing with the seasons of time. Time is measured experientially and takes on new meanings as well. Your internal clock moves with a universal rhythm much like the tides follow the moon and rivers flow into seas. This experience allows you the same renewal and time for reflection that resides within the delicate balance of nature.Your senses become more sensitive and experience moments more fully. Simply living is abundance only in this state can one truly reap the benefits and reward of living simply.

Learning to be Still We live in age where we are continually bombarded by outside stimuli and we have become accustomed to the

stimuli and depend upon it to make us feel alive. However, it is the stimuli and our dependency upon it that robs our spirit of experience. We have to be constantly amused in some way by something because we have not been taught or have not learned how to be with ourselves. Until we learn how to be present with our self and experience what it is, we cannot fully expect others to feel present or that they are a part of us as well. Simplicity is born in treasured moments of stillness and nurtured in the here and now. Learning to be still means allowing yourself to be calm, without outside stimuli so that you can experience what is going on inside of yourself. You can listen to your body, to your breathing, notice where a slight twinge may send a pain, smile and notice how both your face and heart feel. Touch your skin, your hair and experience how that touch really feels, what message it portrays to you about you. What thoughts flow through your mind - allow them to flow, if you fight them -you give them your energy, if you allow them their moments they will flow without struggle. Being still with yourself means letting go of the struggles - the struggles with your self, with life, your job, demands, expectation, etc. Simply enjoy that you are free from the struggles, that you donʼt have to be anywhere or do anything to feel joy and wonder.

Simplicity is joy and wonder. Therefore, simplicity is grace.

Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow

Life is an Adventure … Dare it • Life is a Beauty … Praise it • Life is a Challenge … Meet it • Life is a Duty … Perform it • Life is a Love … Enjoy it • Life is a Tragedy … Face it • Life is a Struggle … Fight it • Life is a Promise … Fulﬁll it • Life is a Game … Play it • Life is a Gift … Accept it • Life is a Journey … Complete it • Life is a Mystery … Unfold it • Life is a Goal … Achieve it • Life is an Opportunity … Take it • Life is a Puzzle … Solve it • Life is a Song … Sing it • Life is a Sorrow … Overcome it • Life is a Spirit … Realize it

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Can Permaculture assist us in ECO transition? perma(nent)+(agri)culture Permanent Culture

Permaculture is a system for designing sustainable human environments. It can be practiced by anyone on any scale from balcony or small town garden to farms villages and cities. A system of perennial agriculture emphasizing the use of renewable natural resources and the enrichment of local ecosystems and cultivation intended to maintain permanent agriculture or horticulture by relying on renewable resources and a self-sustaining ecosystem.

What is permaculture?

Low impact techniques like hygienic compost toilet design, What can permaculture offer in blackwater and greywater our eco transition? recycling are now easier to design to function in ways that Much of permaculture involves are similar to the conveniences what our some of our great of ourr present conventional grandparents instinctively knew wasteful systems. And for those when they lived in villages, of us who must rely on minimal making their own things, and resources the provision of low growing most of their own energy devices like rocket stoves food while buying from local and solar cookers is helpful in sources. It could be said to be creating methods for developing the art of respecting nature and more comfort and abundance. working with it to cultivate land, These cost little and can be plants, animals and people by made out of old tin drums and fostering mutually beneďŹ cial satellite dishes. They reduce the relationships between them. need for wood and protect the Permaculture is a method of natural environment. designing communities in ways that mimic these relationships Then there is the planting of found in the natural ecologies. instant gardens and planning of sustainable urban and rural As we know from recent agriculture. If we look at Cuba catastrophes in Haiti and and growing permaculture Middle East when there are garden communities in the US dire circumstances access to and abroad we can see that not food and water is paramount. only are organic polycultures It makes sense to develop desirable; they work well in localized sources, Water both town and country. Next storage and food growing devlopments can be microsystems in our backyard are generation systems for energy patterns from the past that can that are far more resilient than be redeveloped and integrated large scale coal or nuclear plants with new technologies. the which are at risk of nuclear leaks compost bucket does not have in a world with increasingly to stink and the composting toilet threats of natural disasters. is not our ancestors outhouse.

Living Simply Means Enjoying theElements of Nature!

Give power back to the (little) agricultural, water and land use people, as well as developing ethic and practice. larger scale renewables; it is far In cultivated systems. e.g. Robert more resilient process. Hartʼs forest garden takes as When New Orleans was its model the self-maintaining inundated with flood water and ecosystem of the natural forest. oil spills into the ocean, big By careful choice of plants for problems were heavy metal food, fuel, fibre, fodder, timber and toxins. Permaculturists and using the seven `storiesʼ have developed methods of of the natural forest, a highly producing compost teas, and productive system can be used mycelium and mushrooms established and maintained with to clean the soil. and water. minimum labor. Mollison defines We have the ʻtechnologyʼ, we it as ʻa system of assembling have the experience within the conceptual, material and permaculture movement, we just strategic components in a pattern need the opportunity to take which functions to benefit life In these techniques and designs all its forms. It is the harmonious where they are needed and integration of landscape and demonstrate their value. people providing their food, water, energy. shelter and other Based on observing the earthʼs material and non-material needs natural stytems and patterns in a sustainable wayʼ. and understanding th patterns of energy flows, Permaculture The definition of a sustainable seeks to replicate the synergy of society would be one that fulfills natural systems. The term was its needs without jeopardizing coined by Bill Mollison when future generations. In order he and David Holmgren were for this to come about we must workin in Australia developing take responsibility for our own interdisciplinary earth sciences. lives and work in a spirit of coIt originally meant ʻpermanent operation with a common ethic. agricultureʼ and has since evolved to mean ʻpermanent cultureʼ recognising that no culture or community can survive long without a sustainable

The threefold ethic on which Permaculture is based is: •Care of the Earth - respect for and care of all living and non-living, things, conservation, rehabilitation of degraded systems, ethical use of resources and working for useful and beneﬁcial systems. •Care of People encouraging values which limit consumption and allow access to resources for all so that the basic needs of food, shelter, health care, education and useful and satisfying work may be enjoyed by all. •Redistributing surplus - once having set up the systems and taken care of basic needs, surplus time, energy and materials should be contributed to help others

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the smallest practical area.

•Basic life ethic - recognises the Intrinsic value of all living things regardless of their use to us. They have value because they exist, are functioning and taking part in natural processes.

•use native or naturalised species where possible.

Some principles which will help implementation of these ethics are: •take personal responsibility now. It is no use waiting for someone else to do it. •make your work count. Plant trees where they will survive. Work with those who want to learn. •plan for the long term. How will our actions affect future generations? •design small scale intensive energy efﬁcient systems, use

Nor is it just cramming as many things as possible into a given space.

What is important Is choosing and siting each element (plant, •diversity provides stability animal or structure) so that it performs as many functions and is a buffer against as possible, e.g. a hedge can economic and environmental provide shelter, mulch, privacy, food, animal forage, wildlife change habitat, fuel, and erosion •replace an equal or greater control. Similarly a pond can resource than that used.- reflect light, store water for yield is only limited by our Irrigation and stock, be a fire understanding and ability to break, a wild life habitat, and manage the system. Something part of a grey water recycling system. Each important function can always be added. is supplied by more than •use low energy environmental one element e.g. annual and (sun, wind, water) and biological perennial pasture and fodder (plants, animals) systems to trees for stock. Solar panels and a stove for water heating. It conserve energy. should function efficiently and •bring food-growing back to assist other elements. In this the cities. way we can minimise work (inputs) and waste (outputs) •recycle all waste. Pollution as the output of one element is an output not used by the becomes the input of another system and the needs of the system are supplied by the system. •everything is a gift. See a solution not a problem. Permaculture is not about turning the clock back and being slaves •The heart of Permaculture is to the soil, eking out a living functional design - all aspects as subsistence farmers. In fact, of putting things together to it takes from both traditional achieve an effect not just a look. wisdom and modern science

Here始s a cob oven from the permaculture area at Glastonbury Festival. Note the temporary garden that has been planted in front of it: available at

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and technology. By using our intelligence to design our environments (urban or rural) so that they are neither capital nor labor intensive, then we will not stumble from one quick ﬁx to the next environmental disaster, but will be self-supporting in the long term. Fukuoka, with his natural farming methods, transformed a barren hillside in Japan into a highly productive landscape with comparable yields to those of mechanised chemical farmers. As he himself has said, this has been achieved by working with nature rather than against it; through protracted and thoughtful observation rather than protracted and thoughtless labor.

with the apex sustained by the bottom, but an oceanic circleʼ.

Sussex and in Stroud there is a sustainable village project.

There are examples of people putting Permaculture into practice all over the world:

References:

•Crystal Waters In rural Queensland, Australia. 600 acres with 83 privately owned plots of about one acre each, enabling each family to be selfsufﬁcient in fruit and vegetables. Income is gained from a variety of small businesses in the community. The remainder of the land is owned and managed communally. A community cred it unionaids the development ﬁnancially.

Bill Mollison: Permaculture: A Practical Guide for a Sustainable Future. 1990 Island Press Robert A. de J. Hart: Forest Gardening. 1991 Green Books Kathleen Jannaway: Abundant Living. 1991 Movement for Compassionate Living. Masanobu Fukuoka: The One Revolution. 1978 Rodale Press.

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Permaculture Magazine Editorial Editorial notes from Maddy Harland, Editor of

Permaculture

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•Village Homes, Davis, California. Built in the 1970ʼs In order to attain this Permaculture: Permaculture- a system `harmonious Integration of comprising 200 homes with for sustainable human environments landscape and peopleʼ we communal open spaces and http://www.vedicworld.org must withdraw from destructive food producing areas. Residents systems and invest our time, participate in the design and energy, intelligence and on-going management. Now money in creative alternatives. produces a surplus of food and Mahatma Gandhi envisioned uses 40% less fuel than adjacent `innumerable self sufﬁcient traditionally designed houses. villages where would dwell •In Britain. in addition to many highly intelligent folk whom private gardens, allotments, none could deceive or exploit small holdings and community . The villages would develop in gardens, designs have been ever widening, never ascending commissioned by local councils, circles. Life will not be a pyramid the Body Shop H.Q. in West

SEE a Wisdom Archive on Permaculture Permaculture A selection of articles

related to Permaculture. We recommend this article: Permaculture - 1, and also this: Permaculture - 2. More material related to Permaculture can be found on:YouTube Videos Access & view these articles related to

Permaculture Index of Articles at http://www.experiencefestival. com/permaculture

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12 Key Steps to embarking on your ECO transition journey by Transition Town : transitiontowns.org/TransitionNetwork/ TransitionPrimer for free download and books & resources. Consider joining this movement & reading their books. To begin with, it is important to note that although the term “Transition Town” has stuck, what we are talking about are Transition Cities, Transition Islands, Transition Hamlets, Transition Valleys, Transition Anywhere-You-Find-People. What is a Transition Town (or village / city / forest / island)? Hereʼs how it all appears to be evolving... It all starts off when a small collection of motivated individuals within a community come together with a shared concern: how can our community respond to the challenges, and opportunities, of Peak Oil and Climate Change? They begin by forming an initiating group and then adopt the Transition Model (explained here at length, and in bits here and here) with the intention of engaging a signiﬁcant proportion of the people in their community to kick off a Transition Initiative. A Transition Initiative is a community (lots of examples here) working together to look Peak Oil and Climate Change squarely in the eye and address this BIG question: “for all those aspects of life that this community needs in order to sustain itself and thrive, how do we signiﬁcantly increase resilience (to mitigate the effects of Peak Oil) and drastically reduce carbon emissions (to mitigate the effects of Climate Change)?” After going through a comprehensive and creative process of: •awareness raising around peak oil, climate change and the need to undertake a community lead process to rebuild resilience and reduce carbon •connecting with existing groups in the community •building bridges to local government •connecting with other transition initiatives •forming groups to look at all the key areas of life (food, energy, transport, health, heart & soul, economics & livelihoods, etc) •kicking off projects aimed at building peopleʼs understanding of resilience and carbon issues and community engagement

•eventually launching a community defined, community implemented “Energy Descent Action Plan” over a 15 to 20 year timescale This results in a coordinated range of projects across all these areas of life that strives to rebuild the resilience weʼve lost as a result of cheap oil and reduce the communityʼs carbon emissions drastically. The community also recognises two crucial points: •that we used immense amounts of creativity, ingenuity and adaptability on the way up the energy upslope, and that thereʼs no reason for us not to do the same on the downslope •if we collectively plan and act early enough thereʼs every likelihood that we can create a way of living thatʼs significantly more connected, more vibrant and more in touch with our environment than the oil-addicted treadmill that we find ourselves on today.

Hereʼs the contents of the primer: For more information see: transitiontowns.org •Introduction • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Why Transition initiatives are necessary More about Peak Oil Taking action: the big picture - initiatives at global, national and local levels The Transition Model – what exactly is it? Kinsale 2021 – an Energy Descent Action Plan Transition Town Totnes Other Transition initiatives Setting up your Transition Initiative – criteria Setting up your Transition Initiative – different types Setting up your Transition Initiative – formal structures and constitutions (boredom alert!!) Starting a Transition Initiative – 7 “buts” The 12 steps to Transition, including energy descent planning The wider context of Transition Questions of leadership and structure The role of local government Getting businesses involved Movies for raising awareness Transition Network Conclusion Further Reading

#1. Set up a steering group and design its demise from the outset: This stage puts a core team in place to drive the project forward during the initial phases. We recommend that you form your Steering Group with the aim of getting through stages 2 – 5, and agree that once a minimum of four subgroups (see #5) are formed, the Steering Group disbands and reforms with a person from each of those groups. This requires a degree of humility, but is very important in order to put the success of the project above the individuals involved. Ultimately your Steering Group should become made up of 1 representative from each sub-group. #2. Awareness raising: This stage will identify your key allies, build crucial networks and prepare the community in general for the launch of your Transition initiative.

For an effective Energy Descent Action plan to evolve, its participants have to understand the potential effects of both Peak Oil and Climate Change – the former demanding a drive to increase community resilience, the later a reduction in carbon footprint. Screenings of key movies (Inconvenient Truth, End of Suburbia, Crude Awakening, Power of Community) along with panels of “experts” to answer questions at the end of each, are very effective. (See Transition Initiatives Primer (1MB pdf) for the lowdown on all the movies – where to get them, trailers, what the licencing regulations are, doomster rating vs solution rating) Talks by experts in their ﬁeld of climate change, peak oil and community solutions can be very inspiring. Articles in local papers, interviews on local radio, presentations to existing groups, including schools, are also part of the toolkit to get people aware of the issues and ready to start thinking of solutions.

#3. Lay the foundations: This stage is about networking with existing groups and activists, making clear to them that the Transition Town initiative is designed to incorporate their previous efforts and future inputs by looking at the future in a new way. Acknowledge and honour the work they do, and stress that they have a vital role to play. Give them a concise and accessible overview of peak oil, what it means, how it relates to climate change, how it might affect the community in question, and the key challenges it presents. Set out your thinking about how a Transition Town process might be able to act as a catalyst for getting the community to explore solutions and to begin thinking about grassroots mitigation strategies.

#4. Organise a Great Unleashing: This stage creates a memorable milestone to mark the projectʼs “coming of age”, moves it right into the community at large,

builds a momentum to propel your initiative forward for the next period of its work and celebrates your communityʼs desire to take action. In terms of timing, we estimate that 6 months to a year after your first “awareness raising” movie screening is about right. The Official Unleashing of Transition Town Totnes was held in September 2006, preceded by about 10 months of talks, film screenings and events. Regarding contents, itʼll need to bring people up to speed on Peak Oil and Climate Change, but in a spirit of “we can do something about this” rather than doom and gloom. One item of content that weʼve seen work very well is a presentation on the practical and psychological barriers to personal change – after all, this is all about what we do as individuals. It neednʼt be just talks, it could include music, food, opera, break dancing, whatever you feel best reflects your communityʼs intention to embark on this collective adventure. #5. Form sub groups: Part of the process of developing an Energy Descent Action Plan is tapping into the collective genius of the community. Crucial for this is to set up a number of smaller groups to focus on specific aspects of the process. Each of these groups will develop their own ways of working and their own activities, but will all fall under the umbrella of the project as a whole. Ideally, sub groups are needed for all aspects of life that are required by your community to sustain itself and thrive. Examples of these are: food, waste, energy, education, youth, economics, transport, water, local government. Each of these sub groups is looking at their area and trying to determine the best ways of building community resilience and reducing the carbon footprint. Their solutions will form the backbone of the Energy Descent Action Plan.

#6. Use Open Space: Weʼve found Open Space Technology to be a highly effective approach to running meetings for Transition Town initiatives.

In theory it ought not to work. A large group of people comes together to explore a particular topic or issue, with no agenda, no timetable, no obvious coordinator and no minute takers. However, we have run separate Open Spaces for Food, Energy, Housing, Economics and the Psychology of Change. By the end of each meeting, everyone has said what they needed to, extensive notes had been taken and typed up,

lots of networking has had taken place, and a huge number of ideas had been identiﬁed and visions set out.

BUY LOCAL

The essential reading on Open Space is Harrison Owenʼs Open Space Technology: A Userʼs Guide, and you will also ﬁnd Peggy Holman and Tom Devaneʼs The Change Handbook: Group Methods for Shaping the Future an invaluable reference on the wider range of such tools.

#7. Develop visible practical manifestations of the project: It is essential that you avoid any sense that your project is just a talking shop where people sit around and draw up wish lists. Your project needs, from an early stage, to begin to create practical, high visibility manifestations in your community. These will signiﬁcantly enhance peopleʼs perceptions of the project and also their willingness to participate.

LET IT GO WHERE IT GOES

Thereʼs a difﬁcult balance to achieve here during these early stages. You need to demonstrate visible progress, without embarking on projects that will ultimately have no place on the Energy Descent Action Plan. In Transition Town Totnes, the Food group launched a project called ʻTotnes- the Nut Capital of Britainʼ which aims to get as much infrastructure of edible nut bearing trees into the town as possible. With the help of the Mayor, we recently planted some trees in the centre of town, and made it a high proﬁle event (see left).

#8. Facilitate the Great Reskilling: If we are to respond to peak oil and climate

change by moving to a lower energy future and relocalising our communities, then weʼll need many of the skills that our grandparents took for granted. One of the most useful things a Transition Town project can do is to reverse the “great deskilling” of the last 40 years by offering training in a range of some of these skills. Research among the older members of our communities is instructive – after all, they lived before the throwaway society took hold and they understand what a lower energy society might look like. Some examples of courses are: repairing, cooking, cycle maintenance, natural building, loft insulation, dyeing, herbal walks, gardening, basic home energy efﬁciency, making sour doughs, practical food growing (the list is endless). Your Great Reskilling programme will give people a powerful realisation of their own ability to solve problems, to achieve practical results and to work cooperatively alongside other people. Theyʼll also appreciate that learning can truly be fun.

#9 Build a bridge to Local Government: Whatever the degree of groundswell

your Transition Town initiative manages to generate, however many practical

REDUCE OIL CONSUMPTION

RESKILL

projects youʼve initiated and however wonderful your Energy Descent Plan is, you will not progress too far unless you have cultivated a positive and productive relationship with your local authority. Whether it is planning issues, funding issues or providing connections, you need them on board. Contrary to your expectations, you may well ﬁnd that you are pushing against an open door. We are exploring how we might draft up an Energy Descent Action Plan for Totnes in a format similar to the current Community Development Plan. Perhaps, one day, council planners will be sitting at a table with two documents in front of them – a conventional Community Plan and a beautifully presented Energy Descent Action Plan. Itʼs sometime in 2008 on the day when oil prices ﬁrst break the $100 a barrel ceiling. The planners look from one document to the other and conclude that only the Energy Descent Action Plan actually addresses the challenges facing them. And as that document moves centre stage, the community plan slides gently into the bin (we can dream!).

#10 Honour the elders: For those of us born in the 1960s when the cheap oil party was in full swing, it is very hard to picture a life with less oil. Every year of my life (the oil crises of the 70s excepted) has been underpinned by more energy than the previous years. In order to rebuild that picture of a lower energy society, we have to engage with those who directly remember the transition to the age of Cheap Oil, especially the period between 1930 and 1960.

HONOR OUR ELDERS

While you clearly want to avoid any sense that what you are advocating is ʻgoing backʼ or ʻreturningʼ to some dim distant past, there is much to be learnt from how things were done, what the invisible connections between the different elements of society were and how daily life was supported. Finding out all of this can be deeply illuminating, and can lead to our feeling much more connected to the place we are developing our Transition Town projects.

#11 Let it go where it wants to go…Although you may start out developing your Transition Town process with a clear idea of where it will go, it will inevitably go elsewhere. If you try and hold onto a rigid vision, it will begin to s ap your energy and appear to stall. Your role is not to come up with all the answers, but to act as a catalyst for the community to design their own transition. If you keep your focus on the key design criteria – building community resilience and reducing the carbon footprint – youʼll watch as the collective

genius of the community enables a feasible, practicable and highly inventive solution to emerge.

#12 Create an Energy Descent Plan: Each subgroup will have been focusing

on practical actions to increase community resilience and reduce the carbon footprint. Combined, these actions form the Energy Descent Action Plan. Thatʼs where the collective genius of the community has designed its own future to take account of the potential threats from Peak Oil and Climate Change. So far, we have taken many practical actions in Totnes. However, they add up to just a mere fraction of the ﬁnal range and scope of initiatives that are currently being devised by our community. Now Transition Town are all over the world including California and more are developing al the time. For more information see: transitiontowns.org

Turning lawns to GARDENS

kapitza.com

Transition Network Projectsregister to receive their newsletter featuring ongoing projects: www. transitionnetwor knews. wordpress.com Ready to plant seeds on Plaw Hatch Farm Events included a wild tea party, talks, chicken chat, a food preserving workshop and seed sowing. The Transition Network has received a wonderful award of $50,000 from Artists Project Earth (APE) generated from the sale of three Rhythms Del Mundo albums. Through music and the arts, APE aims to achieve permanent reductions in greenhouse gas emissions to levels that minimise further degradation of ecological systems and human livelihood.Artists Project Earth aims to create a better world by bringing the power of music and the arts to 21st century challenges. It supports effective projects and awareness raising initiatives to combat climate change and raises funds for natural disaster relief. Visit the RDM site to check out all the RDM albums at www.apeuk.org

Iris: Flower of Hope

A sustainable design project to work in a Transition community with real projects and to examine the role of design education took place in Totnes at the begining of April with a group of designers and artists from several universities. The group shared a common belief that while design can始t change the world, it can be part of a world that is changing. Read more about the project here: transformingthefuture. wordpress.com

Itʼs Too Late To Be A Pessimist The popular coffee table book The Earth from Above by French photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand has been made into a stunning film to highlight the damage man is doing to the planet.“Home simply sets out our current situation, while saying that a solution exists” said Arthus-Bertrand. “The filmʼs subtitle could be Itʼs Too Late To Be A Pessimist. We have reached a crossroads; important decisions must be made to change our world. Everybody knows about what the film says, but nobody wants to believe it. So Home adds its weight to the argument of environmental organisations that we need to revert to a more common sense approach and change our consumer way of life.” Instead of emphasising why we didnʼt we react when we could see what was coming, Arthus-Bertrand said that “there is a more optimistic version: They were great. They knew what would happen and they were brave enough to change things. Thatʼs the version I prefer. How did they do it?”The 93 min film can be watched online and downloaded at YouTube www.home-2009.com. See a trailer at http://transitionnetworknews.wordpress. com/2009/06/08/film-review-home/

• transitionculture.org • transitiontowns.org

Make a difference. JOIN the Transition Network

ECO Tranisition LIVE+WORK+PLAY

environments allows us to Live in a Garden

Transition Town Totnes (TTT) started a nut tree planting scheme

Urban Farm- Jude Steele, designer

ARE YOU ASKING YOURSELF USEFUL QUESTIONS? Whether you live in urban or rural places it is possible to change consumption and stress patterns & reap the rewards of living more simply?

Grass to garden, front yard and back 3500 gallon rain water storage Passive solar features Food hedge, food storage Reclaim automobile space Chickens, compost

Rural Vineyard Farm- Jude Steele, designer

What do I really want? Make time to ﬁgure out what you want to do with your life. Find the passion you enjoy doing and stick with it until you are at your greatest ability. Be the you that you want to be. Jude Steele

daybreakcohousing.org

What motivates me? What motivates you? Itʼs an answer you have to discover for yourself. There are so many things that can make everybody content, but to decide on one may be the hardest part.

How can I consume less & enjoy more? Choose and just DO IT. Change your ways!

James Rosenquist

Good Design

is more than ʻprettyʼ. Design is included in all aspects of life and holds many meanings: • useful • aesthetic • unobtrusive • honest • thorough • durable • functional • innovative • efﬁcient • resourceful • ﬂexible •concerned with environment • simple • brings direct solutions • offers new choices • creates positive change Much like our relationships with people, when the objects and places we use are more appealing to us we tend to feel better and our LIVE, WORK & PLAY environments inspire us.

Jude Steele

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Eco Friendly Traditional & Modern Kitchens Using local materials & durable materials and Energy Star appliances

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House & Garden: The Eco-Friendly Kitchen The modern kitchen is a homeʼs hub and highlight. Equal parts cooking area, living room, café, and office, itʼs where family and friends hang out, play, eat and work. With its newly expanded role as a vibrant, all-purpose space, the kitchen has earned a facelift. Bigger, airier, and warmer than ever, it has also gone green. From cabinets and countertops to flooring and appliances, you, too, can create a gorgeous kitchen thatʼs healthier for you and good for the environment. Clear the Air Indoor air pollution is one of the top five public-health hazards. In fact, interior pollutant levels are two to five times (and even up to 100 times) higher than outdoor pollutant levels. A major offender in the home is formaldehyde, found in pressed wood and adhesives containing ureaformaldehyde resins. Also noxious are paints and stains containing VOCs (volatile organic compounds). When building or remodeling your kitchen, use glues, stains, finishes, and woods that donʼt contain these harmful chemicals. Cabinets There are many green cabinet alternatives, including formaldehydefree woods like cherry, maple oak and alder (be sure woods are certified by the Forest Stewardship Council), as well sustainable woods like bamboo—which is actually a tough, fast-growing grass thatʼs stronger than maple. Also on the front lines of cabinetry is wheatboard, a sustainable material made of recycled wheat stalk and straw. Countertops From recycled paper to recycled glass to sustainable wood, there are numerous countertops that are both elegant and efficient. Green options include: IceStone, made of chips of recycled glass in concrete; EuroStone, quartz chips in a resin binder; and ShetkaStone, recycled paper in a formaldehyde-free resin base. Steer clear of granite, a non-renewable resource; once itʼs removed from the earth, itʼs gone forever. Flooring Sound-absorbent, soft underfoot, hypoallergenic, and mold resistant, cork is a practical and beautiful flooring alternative for the kitchen. This renewable resource is made from bark thatʼs peeled off the tree, then allowed to grow back. If you prefer the look of hardwood floors, stick with wood thatʼs been harvested from sustainable forests. Appliances Choose appliances that have earned the Energy Star, a rating that signifies theyʼve passed an energyefficiency test. These appliances use 10 to 15 percent less energy and water than their non-green counterparts. Also consider .Values Central To Voluntary Simplicity. While working for the think-tank, Stanford Research Institute (now SRI International), Duane Elgin co-authored the following report with Arnold Mitchell in 1976 for the Business Intelligence Program. Titled Voluntary Simplicity, this was the most popular report

Eco Kitchen Design As any gardener knows, kitchen waste makes superb compost, but it can often be difficult to find somewhere to store food waste in the kitchen, without releasing unpleasant odors and potential mess. Here are a few composting solutions:

As any gardener knows, kitchen waste makes superb compost, but it can often be difﬁcult to ﬁnd somewhere to store food waste in the kitchen, without releasing unpleasant odors and potential mess. hygenic way.

Maytag: MBF2258WES 21.9 cu.ft Bottom Mount Refrigerator: $1400 30% less than Federal Standard - Energy Star

This high quality, dishwasher safe, stainless steel pail comes complete with carbon filters inside the lid to keep your kitchen odour free. It is a good size to sit neatly on your worktop, and will hold vegetable cuttings, tea bags, egg shells galore. When itʼs full simply carry it out to your compost heap using the practical carry handle.

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Itʼs time to change and transition to eco wise choices. Whether you prefer traditional or modern, choosing pieces that work well, are recycled, easy to maintain, portable & made to last avoids repeated disappointment & wonʼt ﬁll the landﬁlls.

Bronze ﬁxture choices

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Design kitchens with eco beautiful timeless lasting

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Local Fir cabinets window & door trim • charcoal honed granite countertops • transistional lighting • bronze ﬁxtures & knobs • stainless appliances, hood & sink • recyled wood ﬂoor

My Kitchen Garden Seed List: Lettuce- Romain, Boston, Mixed Cabbage- white purple Carrots, Beets, Turnips, Radish Heirloom Tomatoes - Brandywine Cucumbers- English, Longs, Pickles Zucchini, Yellow, Butternut Squash Potatoes, Ruby Red, Gold Rush Oregeno, Basil, Sage, Chive Parsley, Rosemary.Thyme Onion, Leeks, Garlic, Scallon, Peppers- Red, Yellow, Chiles Snow Peas, Beans Sweet Corn, Popcorn Orange, Lime, Lemon, Tangerine Raspberry, Black Caps, Blackberry Nasturtium, Roses, Geranium, Morning Glory, Zinnia, Pansy, Primrose, Peony, Moon Flower...

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Modern Modular Kitchen changes consumption habits. Use timeless quality design foundation pieces you love & when you desire changes make fresh additions to bring new appeal. Choosing portable modular systems allows you to take your beloved kitchen & bath with you. Using local artisians using local and natural non-toxic durable materials creates heirloom pieces your family will cherish.

The motivation in the pleasure principle includes creating the things that refresh and bring easy to life. Yet we know pain will follow if our choices are not sustaninable. Will we be wise enough to maintain RESILIENCE?

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Sub Zero & Wolf Appliances IT PAYS TO BUY THE BEST http://www.subzero.com/livingkitchen/greenkitchen. aspx

Sub-Zero/Wolf ApplianceGreen Green Facts - Compliance: Facts - Manufacturing: • Compliant with Restriction of • Made in the U.S.A Hazardous Substances (RoHS) on all • 75% of stainless steel used in products sold internationally. our products is from recylced mate- • Manufacturing facilities are rial categorized as “Small Quantity Gen• Up to 50% of the plastic erator” by the EPA. used in our refrigerators is recycled • Sub-Zero, Inc. has sigcontent. nificantly reduced Volatile Organic • Our manufacturing facilities Compound (VOC) emissions at its have established scrap reduction manufacturing facilities. objectives to use recyclable materials • All Sub-Zero and Wolf locamore efficiently. tions comply with EPA and state air • Wastewater is not produced emission standards. in the manufacturing process for • The Wisconsin Responsible either Sub-Zero or Wolf appliances. Power Management Program recog• Our manufacturing facilinized Sub-Zero for choosing energy ties have substantially reduced the efficient motors. use of ozone forming hydrocarbon • Sub-Zero and Wolf are partsolvents. nering with international distributors • Returnable containers are to align with the international WEEE used to reduce waste from vendor recycling standard. packaging. • We adhere to The Interna• Nearly all industrial vehicles tional Plant Protection Convectionʼs used in the facilities are electric. A (IPPC) ISPM 15 guidelines governing few specialty vehicles use clean burn- the treatment of solid wood packaging propane. ing. • All refrigerant is recovered • Sub-Zero uses a chilled water during the manufacturing process. storage system to charge building The refrigerant used is non-ozone cooling systems at night when utilities depleting. are operating most efficiently.

Some will argue that quality luxury appliances are conviniences that must be given up in an eco kitchen. Another viewpoint to consider is that purchasing these units built to high green standards with higher power efficiencies and made to last, helps us avoid the appliance waste now filling our land fills and contaminating our soil. Luxury high quality can be a greener choice.

Can Good Design Create Happiness? The aesthetic qualities of design - and the facination and design it inspires - are important elements in our lives. When we walk into a room or garden full of plants and art that reﬂect the elements of

Nature & Design we experience its charm and we feel good! We know how we feel when walking into rooms that are cluttered and mismatched and without order. We know the conclusions we make about the people who live in these spaces. When I walk into someoneʼs home and see stacks of papers & computer stuff on the ﬂoor I roll my eyes. Childhood memories are triggered reminding me how the disorganization of my parentʼs environment drove me crazy! At my auntʼs everything is immaculate in matching white, blue and pink with quality Japanese art but not a comfortable chair can be found. It feels like an outdated showroom more than a home. I smile at her attempt, but wonder why she didnʼt consulted a good designer before spending all that money. Such it the insane mind chatter that I as a designer go through as I walk through my life noticing the challenges and struggles we all go through to create our lives. I guess

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I compensated for the dysfunction aspects of my early life by noticing all the details and accessing every space I walk into or pass by asking myself, ʻWhat will make this better?”. Within thirty seconds I come up with solutions in my mind to make improvements to the space while helping the inhabitants feel better. It is a gift and a curse. My numerologist makes me feel better because he tells me I canʼt help it. My name and the day I was born gave me the predisposition to be both a perfectionist and nurturing, but with creative dominating force. Whether its true or not, this habit helps me use this viewpoint to see improvement possibilities. For most of us it is confusing and tiring to tolerate spaces and products that are uncomfortable and/or donʼt work or feel good. We know when we have walked into a space where we canʼt seem to relate or relax. Yet it has always been a difficult task to define aesthetic qualities and how they affect how we feel. Since words have different meanings for different people it can be difficult to talk about anything visual. Aesthetic quality deals with details, harmonies and the subtleties of shade, color, light, form,

Live with what you LOVE! Keep it simple, organized & beautiful

FilioFocus

smell, function and the balance of a whole variety of elements. These are complex relationships with many choices. We often refer to able designers as having a “good eye” because somehow they sort through the mystery and clutter and find the magic. In order to draw the right conclusions and make the best choices in design it requires a focused awareness on the details and how they can combine to make a cohesive whole impression. For most this requires schooling and extensive experience. For a few it seems to come more naturally, but often comes from their experiences of living in environments where quality design were practiced regularly and may have become cultural patterns. However a ʻgood eyeʼ is achieved, it seems to be a skill only a few can refine to an art form and create truly inspiring My grandmother gave me some great advise that has guided my choices. She said, “Being a ʻjack of all tradesʼ can be useful but not usually pretty. Learn what you love doing well and get paid to do that. Hire others to do what they do well and your life will be more simple, beautiful and fulfilling.” Since my father was the mountain man type convinced everything could be made by his hand and a chain saw and hammer, this was a hard

lesson for me at ﬁrst. But when I realized my childhood home was full of half ﬁnished projects and clutter I took my wise grandmotherʼs words to heart and added a few of my own. Good design is more than ʻprettyʼ. Design is included in all aspects of life and holds many meanings: • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

useful aesthetic unobtrusive honest thorough durable functional innovative efﬁcient resourceful ﬂexible concerned with environment simple brings direct solutions offers new choices creates positive change

Much like our relationships with people, when the objects and places we use are more appealing to us we tend to feel better and our LIVE, WORK & PLAY environments inspire us. Aesthetic designs look friendlier, easier to use and more fun. Our perceptions motivates us to interact with attractive choices and we tend to use them more. First impressions play a large role in how long term attitudes are formed. Aesthetically

pleasing solutions fosters positive feelings and makes us feel good. Most of us know how important it is to understand the role emotion plays in our relationships with people but sometimes forget how the environments we choose and how we organize our possessions affects our happiness. Our home, workplace, community, food, clothes, vacation, and friend choices offer a glimpse into our innermost nature and makes a statement about what we value most. Quality design and aesthetics assists us all in creating choices that enhance our lives. Victor Papanek, author of Design for the Real World, expresses his viewpoint this way, “Design is the patterning and planning of any act toward a desired, foreseeable end... any attempt to separate design, to make it a thing-by-itself works, counter to the fact that design is the primary underlying matrix of life.” Our LIVE, WORK, & PLAY environments can support and inspire our well being and happiness. Design tools help improve and deﬁne our public and private spaces which promote our physical, mental, and spiritual health in a chosen world of our own. How we relate to our immediate surroundings and what we choose to include in our spaces can affect how we experience our life as meaningful.

Live in places that inspire!

ci.hercules.ca.us

Transition to your less consuming LIVE+WORK+PLAY Lifestyle! The choices we include in our environments are reﬂections of how we see our world. All the things we place in our dwellings have meaning. In our ordinary comings and goings, we may rarely notice that the narrative of our life is ﬂavored by these choices. When we think of our objects and environments in this way, we may begin to live poetically. William Lethaby, a scholar of architectural history, tells us, “Architecture is not a battle of styles, nor exclusively an expression of function, but is concerned with the secret meanings that lay deep in the human psyche and related to ancient and universal symbolism... Architecture can only reach its full expression when its form is fraught with meaning and symbolizing some recognized beauty or mystery of life.”

learn deeper meanings that often elude us.

If we wish to design and invent the new, it often helps to know the old patterns and recognize which solutions worked and which failed. Design can be a problem solving process that offers improved options. Good designers can listen to their clients and then focus within, bringing to memory and imagination the knowledge, stories, characters, feelings and attractions weʼve been developing since childhood. When we listen for the resonance of the mythic traditions in our lives, we may

by Jude Steele, designer

Can design create happiness? My experiences have shown that it does. My grandmotherʼs advise encouraged the aesthetic qualities of design in my LIVE+WORK+PLAY choices. They continue to inspire and delight all aspects of our family experiences and environments. We ﬁnd it takes good planning to live well so we design our lives with good intention for quality design. And we are also learning how to support our Mother Nature and leave her proven designs alone as much as possible because we will never be the designer she is! May we all ﬁnd the happiness we came on the planet to enjoy and embellish our experiences with resilient design everywhere.

Jude Steele Collaborative

! 2010 Toyota Prius Price: $22,400The Toyota Prius, the family sedan long the symbol environmental do-gooders, remains at the top of the list of most fuel efďŹ cient widely available vehicles, with 50 mpg combined fuel economy. Read more: thedailygreen.com

http://www.

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Design & Planning

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Design Your HAPPY

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2010 Lexus HS 250h Price: $34,200 The Lexus HS 250h is the most expensive fuel-efďŹ cient car on the market, but it makes a statement as the only luxury hybrid sedan available. It gets 35 mpg, so there is still savings at the pump. Well made cars last longer and helps avoid waste.

Bring in Nature with photography

Photo Images

When you wish to bring Nature into your interiors consider photography

Bring in Great Imagery that has Meaning to You

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Bring in Great Imagery that has Meaning to You Spaces without Art can feel cold & uninspired so ask us about Sandy Landon始s photography available in any size & frame & create your own 707 799-9054/771-0109

Jude Steele Collaborative designs with

Nature & Technologies to create edo friendly solutions

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Live+Work+Play ECO home+office CUSTOM FURNITURE • INTERIORS ARCHITECTURE, RUGS. TEXTILES, CLASSIC DESIGNER SEATING... The Villa Dona is composed of: • The Main Level Entry Great Room - Living/Kitchen Dining Room Studio/Workshop Sunroom/Courtyard Garden Porch Outdoor rooms Laundry/Mechanical Room Offices Bedroom Bathroom/Utility Garage • 2nd Floor Master Suite Bedrooms Bathrooms Den • Lower Basement Mechanical Room Storage/Wine Cellar Workroom For flexible mult-generational use the kitchen Is the focus of family activity and is connected to the central courtyard. Doorways are 36” wide and halls and stairs are 48” wide. Daylighting is dominate with skylights and clearstory windows. Appliances are Energy Star rated. Front loading low water washers are used with porch clothes lines accessible from laundry room to the outdoors. Energy efficient full spectrum lighting is used with low mercury flourescent and long life halegon. Zoned radient hot water floor heating and high volocity air conditioning maintaining efficient comfort zones.Tile and stone floors absorb passive solor exposure. Edible landscaping and natural non-toxic finishes and furnishings compliment the amenities of this eco friendly LIVE+PLAY+WORK urban courtyard villa.

The project involved the conversion of a small, dark ranch style house into this spacious, airy, Italianate villa with studios and gardens.

Villa Dona

Eco-friendly Site and Materials • Passive Solar • Geo-thermal Heating • Super Insulated • Re-used & Re-cycled Materials • Natural & Non-Toxic Finishes • Edible Landscaping with focus toward light and reflection.

Jude Steele

Collaborative

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Save WOOD Use wood as a precious commodity. Reuse, recycle, replant, and use energy efďŹ cient, non polluting systems.

Insulate Insulate INSULATE!

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URE • ART • ECO DESIGN OBJECTS • TECHNOLOGIES • DESIGN WORLDWIDE + ASK US TO FIND your resources & advise: eco/alternative sysING & BUILDING MORE SUSTAINABLY SO WE ALL THRIVE ON OUR PLANET!

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Thank you for visiting our site. (707) 799-9054/771-0109 judesteele@me.com call for a free consultation lohdensteele.com - judesteele.com - judecollection.com - ecotransitionhome.com