The Earthworks Eco Village Design Group

In a world where poor decision-making has led us to dangerous exposure levels of toxins in our air, water and food, the seeds of modern disease have been given a clear path to grow. We are witnessing environmental changes that have put entire ecosystems on the verge of collapse.

It is easy to become disillusioned with the paths our culture is traveling. Yet it is also easy to see that it’s time to enact necessary changes in our own lifestyles, and in our communities.

We are in for some significant changes to the very fabric of our society and many are looking for a new lifestyle that addresses these issues and offers the promise of a healthy a sustainable lifestyle where one can live in harmony with nature.

Many of us have had a dream of living in a world created by conscious decisions, which lead us to a point where the human footprint has a positive impact and actually restores natural systems. There is an emerging desire to be part of a community that is doing it “the right way”, and dealing with our social, economic and environmental issues in an enlightened manner.

That dream is coming true, as small groups of committed people set out to create intentional communities with this vision in mind - Integrating the best practices for sustainable and healthy living into a holistic approach to community design.

Earthworks Eco Villages is a professional incubation and design service providing project planning, design and development for intentional communities.

The team at Earthworks does this through a development system which integrates the social, ecological and economic needs of each community. They have designed wide variety of intentional communities over the last 30 years, and act as consultants on a wide spectrum of community development projects.

Earthworks started out three decades ago as a think tank that focused on solutions to the worlds social and environmental issues but it soon realised that all solutions revolved around optimizing local solutions so the think tank soon evolved into a team of socal, environmental researchers and designers dedicated to helping communities implement best practices in community development.

Earthworks provides planning and design services for eco-communities, as well as ongoing research projects into sustainable technologies that can help us to live optimally in uncommonly sensable communities.

The Earthworks-developed projects are designed to demonstrate best practice strategies for long-term energy and food security, while creating healthy environments for humans to inhabit.

By planning today for the world we want tomorrow, we insure this and future generations will have a planet and a communities that can continue to provide what humans need to thrive. "We vision a world where mankind can live in harmony with the natural world which provides us with our life support systems. A future where our communities provide sustainable and healthy places for us to live and to grow."

Earthworks is dedicated to researching and developing sustainable-living techniques and technologies, including sustainable energy systems, organic food production, green homes, eco-enterprise development, eco-education and natural health.

Earthworks has been exploring solutions for the last 30 years which contribute to best-practice designs and templates for sustainable communities.

The Earthworks design team has visited over 100 eco villages around the world to examine what approaches have been working well. This represents years of research that informs our approach as we develop techniques and utilize technologies for sustainable agriculture, housing, energy, and resource utilization. Earthworks projects demonstrate sustainable development principles, and are examples of optimized ecologically-based development. Earthworks plans apply permaculture principles to provide community resources that work with (and are inspired by) our natural support systems.

Eathworks use techniques and technologies that implement permaculture principles that meet the needs of residents within each project design. They can help you plan and develop solutions based on sustainable economic and lifestyle models, that incorporate food and energy security as well as resources for education, eco-business, and recreation.

The wide range of intentional communities they have designed have had many different purposes, but all have sustainable principles at their core.

By planning communities that are designed around embacing and empowering the social, ecological and economic needs of each community, we create an exceptionally healthy canvas for the growth of both the individuals that live there and the community itself. They say it the best "Our real work is not about the landscapes, technology and structures we work with, its about creating extraordinary opportunites for the people and the community to thrive and live up to thier true potential."

You can see the kind of projects they design at earthworksecovillage.com