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Hi, I'm James Hardiman and I have been thinking about various sorts of co-operation in living arrangements since I arrived back in the UK after two years in Singapore and needing to set up home.

My earliest thoughts began because of the expense of buying various pieces of domestic equipment that stood idle most of the time--such as a lawnmower, washing machine and tumble dryer (we didn't have children back then).  I wondered whether we could make some sort of shared arrangement with the neighbours.  They looked on me askance, no doubt writing me off as some sort of cheap-skate weirdo.  Which wasn't far short of the truth.

Bowden House Community in Devon

Since those far-off days I have spent time investigating and experimenting with intentional communities living in old manor houses, spiritual communities living in farmhouses in Dorset, intentional communities experimenting with alternative technology in the Catskills in up-state New York, and many more.

I have also spent a lot of time researching and thinking about various subjects behind all this.  Things like how to design and orient buildings so that they take advantage of the sun in winter and shade in summer.  How to capture and use rainwater.  How to recycle heat, and how to build houses and other buildings so that they conserve heat.  I also started to think about sustainable food production (and, more recently, regenerative food production, on the basis that we've already messed things up enough that we don't want to sustain this mess, but to rebuild where we can).

Valdaura Green Fab Lab, Barcelona

Ten years ago I had an epiphany while standing in the hills north-west of Barcelona, talking to one of the founders of the Valdaura Green Fab Labs, a part of the Institute of Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (IAAC).  Jonathan asked me if I'd ever heard of Wikihouse, and I hadn't.  My life was about to change!

A Wikihouse is a structure that you design with Sketchup, and then cut out all the parts you need from sheets of 18mm plywood, and slot them all together.  The only tools you need are a moderately sophisticated CNC machine, and a mallet (which you can make yourself from cut-out 18mm plywood).  What struck me then was how much money you could save when building a house yourself, using this build technology.  Jonathan also introduced me to the idea of using Community Land Trusts (CLTs) to buy and own land at lower than the normal cost for land with development planning permission.

The concept of Wikihouse

Suddenly I saw the possibility of groups of people being able to radically lower their cost of living, with all sorts of benefits flowing on from that.  I have written about that in one of the blog posts.

This lead to Susan and me developing the concept of Foldehampton, Village for the Future.  The word "for" there was really important to us: it was an acknowledgment of Rebecca Hoskings' wonderful video, "A Farm for the Future".

Take some time out and watch this: I think it gives hope, as well as a feel for my philosophy for a co-housing project (even though it doesn't mention housing)  Watch out for where Martin Crawford reckons you can feed 10 people per acre with a Permaculture Food Forest.  That's getting on for 400 people fed on a 40-acre site!!

A Farm for the Future from Kromwell Gardens on Vimeo.

Blackfoot 2400x1200 CNC

But I digress.  Let's go back for a moment to my epiphany standing on the hillside at Valdaura.  It all hinged on the Wikihouse technology meaning it would be really easy and cheap to self-build, provided you had a CNC machine.

I was so excited I bought five.

A daddy CNC machine (Blackfoot), two mummy CNC machines (Shopbot Desktops) and two baby ones (Shopbot

Shopbot Desktop

Handibot).  The Blackfoot, one Desktop, and one Handibot are currently in Susan's son's workshop: he has made a business using them.

Shopbot Handibot

The other Desktop and Handibot are in my workshop, waiting to be installed in the workshop at New Forest Co-housing.


But Wikihouse didn't work out the way I hoped.

It turns out that the idea behind Wikihouse couldn't be implemented (it's a long story).  I'll say why when I complete the blog post on building technologies.

So that's the overview: the details are in the blog posts, listed on the right.