Since early 2017 we’ve been visiting places where people live in alternative ways. We select places where there is a focus on at least one of the following topics: community life, sustainability, permaculture, footprint reduction and spirituality. Below is a list of all the places we’ve visited, ordered by country.

NETHERLANDS

  • Marjolein in het Klein
    • Marjolein Jonker lives in a tiny house. She is one of the first in Holland to legally live in a tiny house and be really public about it.
  • Strowijk IEWAN Nijmegen
    • This awesome community lives in a very special council flat: it’s made of straw bales and is packed full of features to reduce the residents’ footprint.
  • ‘t Natuurlijk Huus
    • Agnes en Harrie built a house in Raalte where comfort and sustainability go hand in hand. Their vision is that sustainable living is possible while maintaining our current living standards.
  • Eco-house of Peter Simons and family
    • Peter Simons and his family are building their own ecological house. They focus on simplicity and slowing down the pace of life. The house has beautiful round curves and is built with mostly natural materials like straw, cob and wood.
  • Eco-house at the Hobbitstee
    • The community at the Hobbitstee in Drente is building a new house, that’s focussed on reusing salvaged materials and sourcing natural building materials locally. We helped out with cob-plastering.
  • Aardehuizen Olst 
    • A community with 23 houses that are modeled after Michael Reynold’s Earth Ship concept. Each house has a unique flavour because the residents helped to build and design them. As a decision making model for the community they use sociocratic methods based on consensus.

BELGIUM

  • Shangri-Lah
    • A place with a focus on spirituality. Here the guiding principle is allowing creation to flow freely. Peter and Mieke shape this unique, fairy-like place and welcome anyone who is looking to retreat from the world for a bit.
  • De Weegbree
    • A community where 5-10 people live together on 1 ha. The focus is on living in connection with the natural world, in a more simple way. Most residents live in yurts, for example. We helped out with insulating a yurt.
De Yurt van Sina en Michel

FRANCE

  • La Vie Naturelle
    • Watse and Mathilde are setting up their permaculture garden at course centre L’Huy Preau in the Morvan. And they also built a beautiful hectagonal straw-bale house.
  • Which?Garden at Chateau Fougerette
    • At this crazy castle in the Morvan a beautiful permaculture garden is emerging. We helped Sina and Michel for a couple of weeks and became dear friends.
  • Eotopia
    • A strong vision and welcoming hearts, that is what we found at the eco-village startup Eotopia in the Morvan. Ideals around gift-economy, veganism and sharing from the heart are explored here.
  • Love-Shack project
    • Brice Mathey builds beautiful Hobbit-like structures on his land in Bretagne. By combining his creative and DIY skills the earth is shaped into the most wonderful forms. Brice also hosts crazy, fun, really inspiring building workshops. We joined for two weeks and learned a lot.
  • Ker Terre
    • Founder Evelyn started experimenting with lime and hemp as building materials about 25 ago. Since then many cute and imaginative cottages have risen on her plot of land in Bretagne. She wants to connect back to nature and live with simple means.
  • Ecolonie
    • Big community in the Vosges. Henk-Jan de Blaauw is the visionary of this community, that has a strong vision about how to work towards sustainable and wholesome living.
  • De Natuurlijke Tijd
    • Hans bought a ruin in the Vosges 18 years ago. Since then he has made it into a wonderful living space. He tries to find all building materials in nature, because this stimulates his creativity. He also initiates adolescents males into manhood.

PORTUGAL

  • Magic Valley
    • Our dear friends Else and Haico are starting a new life on a steep slope in the Benfeita region. They are trying to really reduce their impact on the planet and at the same time improve the natural state of (a tiny peace of) the earth. They are planting trees, making a garden, building a house…
  • Quinta do Vale
    • Wendy started her permaculture project 8 years ago. Just when she felt she had things in order a blazing fire destroyed a good part of her quinta in 2017. She still feels that this is her place and project though. In fact, she sees it as an opportunity to fix things that were wrong with the previous designs.
  • Leen’s Cob-house
    • Leen builds her own house, in her own style. As much as possible in a natural way, and with a lot of learning-by-doing. We helped and filmed for a day.
  • Quinta das Pedras Alvas
    • Franz en Kasia are starting a permaculture garden near Tabua, in Central Portugal. Their enthousiasm and spirit is contagious. We suspect this place is going to be a shining example of permaculture principles in a few years.
  • Mount of Oaks
    • Beautiful community, that was conceived 12 years ago.  Two couples and a child try to return to simple living, with open hearts and courageous spirit.