Land-based community design
An integrated model for 15-household settlements combining affordable housing, low-impact infrastructure, small-scale diversified farming, intergenerational community living, and a progressive approach to inclusivity, economic viability, and governance.
Introduction
This document presents a model for beautiful, affordable, low-impact settlements rooted in land, community, and economic reality.
It isn’t intended as a fixed blueprint. Every landscape, community, and cultural context is different, and any successful settlement will need to respond to the particular regional social ecological and conditions in which it emerges.
Neither does it claim to present fundamentally new ideas. Almost every element explored here already exists somewhere: natural building, agroecology, commons ownership, community governance, appropriate technology, regenerative economics, and many others are all well-developed fields in their own right.
What interests me is what happens when these approaches are treated not as separate innovations, but as parts of a single integrated system. Many of the challenges facing land-based projects arise not because individual solutions are lacking, but because they remain fragmented. This proposal asks what becomes possible when they are designed to work together, each reinforcing the others to create forms of living that are more resilient, more affordable, and more life-enhancing than any one approach could achieve in isolation.
The proposal has grown out of many years spent visiting land-based projects across Britain, alongside my own experience of low-impact living, natural building, and systems thinking. It should be understood as an evolving document: something to refine through dialogue, practical experimentation, and collaboration with others working towards similar goals.
Overview
Designing for quality of life
It might seem unrealistic to claim that we can create beautiful settlements delivering high quality of life while at the same time maximising for both social equality and ecological recovery—but maybe that’s because the world we’re used to has so spectacularly failed to do so.
Let’s not be constrained by that failure, but instead give ourselves the chance to do better—much, much better.
In brief, the settlement design put forward in this proposal would create:
Affordable natural homes
Beautiful, nature-inspired, straw-bale eco-homes with green roofs, light footprints, and low running costs. No rent and buy-in starting at £0 make healthy, secure housing accessible to people from all backgrounds.
Slow, connected living
Slow living rich in nature interactions and social integration, made possible through careful community design, shared facilities, and a culture of connection—plus universal basic services and income for all residents.
A return to land & skills
Nature-embedded lifestyles rooted in the land and seasons foster a sense of belonging to the wider web. A wide range of land-based skills and crafts are used in their natural context: everyday life through the turning year.
Food security close to home
A diverse mosaic of forest gardens, vegetable gardens, and small-scale field systems supplies abundant, fresh, seasonal diets from the ground beneath our feet. The proposal aims for 60–80% food sovereignty from the land.
Sufficiency & luxury
Modest private homes and neo-peasant lifestyles combine with extensive shared facilities and services financed through community-run enterprises to create lives of personal sufficiency and communal luxury.
Inclusivity, rooted in place
Deep commitments to inclusivity, equal ownership, non-hierarchical governance, and social cohesion, all supported by reciprocal relationship with the land and the wider local community.
Community design highlights
Taking the proposal a level deeper, below are the core features of the settlement design. Together, they weave into an integrated whole where ecological principles, social wellbeing, and economic resilience work in harmony to create thriving settlements that are accessible to people from all backgrounds.
Housing
Beautiful yet modest 1–3 bed natural homes with straw-bale walls, lime or clay plasters, and reciprocal frame living roofs. Low-impact design keeps energy needs small while embedding the buildings deeply in the landscape. Homes stay cool in summer, warm in winter, and cost a fraction of conventional builds—typically £30,000–£50,000 per dwelling when built by the community using natural materials, sweat equity, and volunteer participation.
Land and layout
Fifteen households on 40–50 acres, laid out around a central hub. Mosaic-style land use balances 10 acres residential, 20 acres agroecology, and 10–20 acres agroforestry and conservation. Permaculture zoning extends from kitchen gardens near the hub to staples and grazing further out. Each household sits on its own half-acre for personal use, while the remaining land is managed communally.
Shared infrastructure
A circular hub seats 40+ for meals, councils, and events, with a commercial-spec kitchen and cool store. Nearby are a yoga/workshop/dance hall, ceremonial space, bath house, laundry, maker workshop, digital office, guest house, bunkhouse, and a discreet six-pod eco-tourism site for communal income generation. Community infrastructure occupies around 2½ acres and is sited centrally amidst food forests, open spaces, and vegetable gardens.
Food systems
Target 60–80% on-site food through no-dig beds, polytunnels, staple crop rotations, on-site compost, a diverse food forest, mushroom logs, bees, and small mixed livestock. Regular shared meals, preserving days, and bulk-buy partnerships; sliding-scale CSA shares and solidarity boxes for neighbours. Universal community income covers all additional basic food costs for residents.
Energy and water
Conserve first through super-insulation and shared amenities. Solar PV with batteries meets baseload; solar thermal covers summer hot water; rocket mass heaters provide clean heat. Potable borehole for drinking; extensive rainwater storage; swales and ponds; reed beds recycle greywater; compost loos close the nutrient cycle and return fertility to the soil.
Governance and shared work
Sociocratic circles, consent decision-making, clear roles, and retrospectives. Adults contribute approximately 10 hours a week across Food, Land, Energy & Water, Buildings, Care & Culture, Children & Education, Enterprise, and Liaison. Regular child-inclusive councils give young people a voice in community thinking.
Inclusion and access
Reserved places for families, elders, and disabled residents. At least two fully accessible dwellings, plus step-free routes, resting points, lighting, and signage. An Inclusivity Committee monitors feedback and proposes improvements. Tiered buy-ins from £0–£200k+ on a means-tested basis equalise access to land and home ownership. Community-wide universal basic income and services—covering food, energy, and transport—reduce financial pressure and enable genuine participation regardless of background or means.
Livelihoods and enterprise
Eco-tourism generates income, complemented by courses, natural-building services, and food and craft products. The target is approximately £200k annual revenue for the commons, helping to cover basic services, maintenance, and a modest universal basic income for residents. Residents combine paid work (on- or off-site), communal roles, skill-building, and mutual aid. The emphasis is on creating an environment of financial sufficiency in which other forms of wealth can flourish.
Community design in detail
The following sections explore in detail how this community design brings together all the elements necessary for thriving land-based settlements—from the physical infrastructure and governance systems to the economic models and social practices that make this way of life both viable and accessible.
Households
Each settlement would bring together 15 households of diverse composition—individuals, couples, families with children, and multi-generational groups—creating a balanced demographic mix that reflects the wider community, with households ranging from single occupants to families of four or five.
This scale ensures a dynamic, supportive environment whilst maintaining the intimate size necessary for strong social bonds and effective governance.
Household selection would prioritise diversity across age, background, skills, and income levels, creating a resilient community ecosystem.
This proposal would specifically reserve at least:
3 households for families with young children
2 households for older residents (60+)
2 households for people with disabilities
5 households at buy-in costs of £0–£50,000
The aim is to create settlements accessible to everyone seeking to come home to the land—regardless of background or means.
Inclusivity
The proposal is built upon a strong foundation of inclusivity, diversity, and accessibility in all aspects of its design and functioning. It recognises that intentional communities have historically lacked diversity, and seeks to address this proactively.
Key aspects of the inclusivity approach include:
Economic inclusivity through a tiered buy-in model, ensuring people from different socioeconomic backgrounds can participate.
Physical accessibility in all communal buildings and pathways, with at least two fully accessible residential units designed for residents with mobility challenges.
Cultural inclusivity through actively seeking diversity in membership and creating governance structures that amplify marginalised voices.
Age inclusivity, welcoming people across all generations and designing spaces and activities that cater to different age groups.
Housing
Each household would have a house on its own half-acre plot, providing privacy while maintaining community connection.
The houses would be modest but comfortable and beautiful in an organic, nature-inspired way, constructed using low-impact natural building techniques including straw-bale walls, clay/lime rendering, and living turf roofs.
The designs draw inspiration from exemplary natural buildings such as Charlie & Meg’s eco-home in Wales, which demonstrates how traditional materials can create highly attractive, low-cost, comfortable, and energy-efficient dwellings.
Houses would range from one to three bedrooms, tailored to the initial household composition. Each home would feature:
Super-insulated straw-bale walls (450mm thickness) achieving U-values below 0.15 W/m²K.
Rainwater harvesting systems and composting toilets.
Locally sourced timber for structural elements and interior finishes.
Clay or lime plasters for healthy indoor air quality.
Living green roofs for visual integration and ecological micro-habitat creation.
High-efficiency rocket-stove heating, cooking, and water heating, combined with solar thermal heating (potentially integrated into a district heating system).
Additional rooms could be added to smaller houses as needed for expanding families, up to a maximum of three bedrooms, built in the same style as the original structure.
For families with older children seeking additional independence, detached pods (simple small roundhouses of 3–4m diameter) could be erected within private plots, up to a maximum of two pods. These would incorporate the same natural building principles as the main dwellings but at a smaller scale, creating stepping stones to independence while maintaining family connection.
Community infrastructure
In addition to private houses, the proposal includes substantial low-impact shared infrastructure designed to foster social connection, support daily living, and enable community enterprises.
Community Hub
A spacious circular structure (120m²) with an open-plan kitchen, dining area for 40+ people, and comfortable social space. This central gathering point would host community meals (3–5 times weekly), celebrations, meetings, and informal socialising. It would include a certified kitchen for preserving harvests, brewing, baking, and preparing value-added products for community use and potential sale.
An adjoining schoolroom (30m²) would provide space for children’s education and adult learning, while a separate quiet meeting room (25m²) would accommodate small group work and private conversations.
Yoga / Workshop Space
A beautiful circular structure (100m²) adjoining the community hub, featuring natural light, wooden floors, and excellent acoustics. This multifunctional space would accommodate group yoga, dance, workshops, educational events, and could also be made available to local community groups.
Ceremonial Space
A traditional thatched roundhouse (50m²) set in a quiet corner of the community land. This space would provide a link with our ancestral past, while offering a place for ceremony, deeper sharing, contemplation, and introspection.
Bath House
An innovative facility featuring showers, baths, and a small sauna, all set within an environment that also functions as a heated growing and propagation space. Sculpted cob walls and a glazed roof would create a unique atmosphere, while a super-efficient thermal mass rocket stove would provide heat for both bathing and plants (potentially integrated into a district heating system). Greywater would be filtered through a reed bed system before being reused for irrigation.
Laundry House
A central washing facility with energy-efficient machines, a drying room with heat recovery, and outdoor drying lines. This shared resource would significantly reduce the settlement’s overall energy and water consumption compared with individual household laundry facilities. Greywater would again be filtered through reed beds before reuse.
Food Production Infrastructure
Including four large polytunnels (30m × 8m each), tool storage, harvest processing space, and composting systems to support year-round food production for community consumption and market gardening enterprises.
Office / Digital Hub
A dedicated office with high-speed internet, shared computing resources, printing facilities, and workstations. This would support remote working, online learning, and community administration while containing digital technology within designated spaces.
Guest House
A comfortable three-bedroom eco-building for visitors, family members, prospective residents during trial stays, and departing residents during periods of transition, constructed using the same principles as the private homes.
Volunteer Accommodation
An eight-bed bunkhouse with shared facilities for volunteers and WWOOF participants contributing to food production and wider community projects.
Glamping Site
A thoughtfully designed area featuring six small roundhouse sleeping pods with shared composting toilets, solar showers, and cooking and dining facilities. The site would be carefully integrated into the landscape through native planting, permaculture gardens, natural screening, and reed-bed greywater treatment.
Workshop / Maker Space
A practical workshop equipped for woodworking, repairs, maintenance, and craft production, supporting both community needs and enterprise activities.
Access Infrastructure
Permeable parking areas, wheelchair-accessible paths connecting key community spaces, bicycle storage, and a network of tracks and footpaths throughout the site.
Energy Systems
Renewable energy infrastructure including solar PV, battery storage, monitoring systems, and, where appropriate, small-scale wind or micro-hydro generation.
All community buildings would be constructed using natural building techniques that showcase a range of low-impact approaches, creating living examples of regenerative construction.
Land
Site Size
The proposal explores settlements occupying 40–50 acres in total. This site size allows for truly sustainable land management at a human scale.
More specifically, the site size has been carefully determined to balance several key factors:
Sufficient scale for meaningful ecological restoration and biodiversity creation.
Adequate productive land to achieve significant food sovereignty (estimated 60–80% of community food needs).
Enough space for each household to have privacy while also maintaining community cohesion.
A landscape large enough to support diverse ecosystems but small enough to maintain through largely manual methods.
Economic viability, balancing land costs with the need for productive acreage to support livelihoods.
Manageable maintenance requirements that won’t overburden the community labour pool.
Land Allocation
The total 40–50 acres would be allocated as follows:
10 acres for residential use.
20 acres of agroecological land.
10–20 acres of agroforestry, rewilding, and conservation land.
More specifically, the land would be used in the following ways:
Residential – private and communal (10 acres)
Half an acre private plot for each household, totalling 7.5 acres for all 15 plots.
Private plots containing a small eco-home (with a living green roof providing visual integration with the landscape as well as additional ecological habitat), individual rainwater harvesting, plus space for growing, crafting, and recreation.
2.5 acres for shared community infrastructure including communal buildings, common spaces, pathways, parking, and enterprise activities.
Agroecological – communal productive land (20 acres)
4 acres horticulture with polytunnels.
8 acres arable and staple crops (wheat, barley, potatoes, beans).
8 acres animal husbandry (e.g. 2 milking cows, 20 sheep, 6 pigs, approximately 100 chickens).
Agroforestry / rewilding / conservation (10–20 acres)
2–4 acres diverse food forest.
2–4 acres short-rotation willow coppice.
3–6 acres native woodland restoration.
3–6 acres species-rich meadow.
The allocation of land uses has been carefully balanced to create a mosaic ecosystem that supports both human needs and natural living systems. Integrated into this living mosaic would be wildlife ponds, nature corridors connecting habitats across the site, and hedgerows along boundaries and between different land uses.
The overall layout follows permaculture principles, with zones radiating outward from the central community area according to frequency of use and management intensity.
Together, these elements seek to create beautiful, nature-embedded residential spaces, achieve substantial food production and enterprise capacity, and actively contribute to nature recovery.
Children & family life
Families with children of all ages form an important part of this proposal. The intention is to create settlements in which children can grow up surrounded by nature, meaningful work, supportive relationships, and multiple generations.
The proposal includes:
A dedicated schoolroom within the community hub equipped with educational resources and art supplies.
Outdoor play spaces incorporating natural elements such as tree houses, willow tunnels, and mud kitchens.
A structured childcare rota integrated into the wider community work system.
Support for diverse educational approaches including home education, forest school principles, and partnerships with local schools.
Children would be gently encouraged to participate in age-appropriate community activities, allowing them to develop practical skills, environmental awareness, and social responsibility through everyday life. This might include tending gardens, helping with animal care, preparing food, or contributing to community arts and celebrations.
Regular child-inclusive councils would ensure young people have a genuine voice in community decision-making while fostering belonging and agency from an early age.
The proposal also explores partnerships with local educational initiatives, including forest schools, alternative education providers, and mainstream schools, creating a wide range of educational pathways while strengthening relationships with the surrounding community.
Communal work
Every adult resident would contribute approximately ten hours each week to shared community work. This contribution is intended to support the settlement’s functioning while distributing responsibility fairly across the community.
With approximately twenty-five adult residents, this represents around 250 hours of community work each week. Together with two to eight volunteers contributing around fifteen hours weekly, the proposal assumes a total communal work capacity of approximately 280–370 hours per week.
These hours would be distributed across essential areas including:
Food production (approximately 35%)
Community enterprises (20%)
Care work (15%)
Infrastructure and maintenance (15%)
Food preparation (10%)
Administration and governance (5%)
The proposal recognises that different forms of work require different kinds of energy and seeks to create a balanced system accommodating different abilities, circumstances, and stages of life. Flexibility would be built in to respond to illness, caring responsibilities, seasonal variation, and personal needs.
Skills development would be integrated throughout the work system, with experienced members mentoring others to build both individual capacity and community resilience. The overall intention is to create a culture of shared contribution that avoids burnout while ensuring the settlement’s essential needs are met.
Food production & consumption
The proposal explores a high degree of food self-sufficiency through a regenerative agroecological approach, with a target of producing 60–80% of the settlement’s food needs on site. This combines the efficiency of market gardening with the biodiversity of food forests, the protein supply of small-scale animal husbandry, and common staple crops.
Production systems
Food production is based on a small-scale, diverse approach, comprising:
4 acres of intensive horticulture gardens using no-dig methods, producing vegetables year-round through succession planting, protected growing, and careful soil management, including polytunnels for season extension and seedling production.
8 acres for staple crops.
Small-scale mixed animal husbandry on 8 acres, including 2 milking cows, 20 sheep, 6 pigs, and around 100 chickens.
2–4 acres of food forest containing fruit and nut trees, perennial vegetables, and medicinal plants.
Mushroom cultivation in woodland areas and on specially prepared logs and substrates.
Honeybees.
Soil care
The proposal assumes healthy, living soil is maintained through:
Extensive composting systems including hot composting, vermicomposting, and bokashi.
Minimal soil disturbance using no-dig methods throughout the gardens.
Cover cropping and green manures to maintain soil fertility.
Careful integration of animal systems for natural fertilisation.
Rotation of staple crops to prevent pest and disease build-up while maintaining soil fertility.
Community food culture
The proposal emphasises:
Shared meals 3–5 times weekly in the community hub.
A seasonal, balanced diet comprising plenty of plants, not much meat, and maximum variety.
Food preservation techniques including fermenting, dehydrating, and cold storage to extend seasonal abundance.
Celebrations centred around harvest festivals and seasonal food traditions.
Skill-sharing workshops on food production, preparation, and preservation.
External sourcing
For foods that cannot be produced on site, the proposal assumes:
Direct relationships with local organic farmers.
A bulk-buying system for additional staples, focusing on local, organic, and fair-trade sources.
Imported foods limited to essential items not available locally.
Food justice
The proposal recognises the importance of food security beyond the boundaries of the settlement and explores:
Sliding-scale community-supported agriculture (CSA) shares for the wider community.
Free food boxes for those experiencing food insecurity.
Sharing surplus produce with local food banks and community initiatives.
Educational events on growing food in small spaces.
Participation in seed-saving networks to preserve genetic diversity.
Through this integrated approach, the proposal seeks to significantly reduce food-related carbon emissions while building food security, ecological resilience, and strong community food culture. The food systems also serve as living classrooms for visitors, volunteers, and others interested in replicable models of small-scale diversified food production.
Water
Integrated water systems
The proposal centres on a comprehensive water management strategy based around conservation, harvesting, and the careful use of groundwater resources.
Primary water supply
A carefully sited borehole would serve as the main water source, providing fresh groundwater for drinking and cooking. This would be complemented by:
Professional hydrogeological assessment to determine sustainable extraction rates.
Regular water quality testing.
Energy-efficient pumping powered by renewable energy systems.
UV treatment for biological safety without chemical treatment.
Rainwater harvesting
Extensive collection systems gather rainfall from all building roofs, storing it in:
Underground cisterns with a minimum combined capacity of 100,000 litres.
Above-ground tanks integrated into buildings (minimum 5,000 litres per building).
Passive landscape features including swales and ponds that slow, spread, and sink water across the site.
Greywater recycling
All non-toilet wastewater would be filtered through:
Kitchen greywater systems using grease traps and biological filtration.
Bathroom greywater directed to reed-bed systems.
Laundry water filtered through woodchip and mycofiltration systems.
Filtered greywater would then be reused for landscape irrigation, significantly reducing freshwater demand.
Blackwater treatment
Human waste would be managed through:
Compost toilets in most dwellings, creating valuable fertiliser for non-food plants.
Small-scale constructed wetlands for any flush toilets required for accessibility.
Monitoring systems to ensure zero contamination of groundwater or surface water.
Conservation measures
Water use would be minimised through:
Low-flow fixtures throughout the settlement.
Water monitoring systems with visible feedback.
Shared laundry facilities.
Drought-tolerant planting and mulched gardens.
Water governance
A dedicated water working group would:
Monitor water use and implement conservation measures.
Maintain water infrastructure and oversee quality testing.
Develop educational resources for residents and visitors.
Liaise with relevant authorities where appropriate.
Through this integrated approach, the proposal assumes that a significant proportion of water needs can be met through harvesting and recycling, reducing pressure on groundwater resources while increasing resilience to drought.
Energy
The proposal explores an energy strategy that combines restraint with appropriate renewable technologies, creating a resilient, low-carbon system capable of meeting everyday needs comfortably while remaining within ecological limits.
Energy conservation
The first priority is reducing demand through:
Passive building design including super-insulation, thermal mass, and appropriate glazing.
Shared infrastructure that reduces duplication.
Seasonal patterns of living that respond to natural light and temperature.
Community-wide energy monitoring.
Renewable generation
The proposal includes:
Ground-mounted solar PV.
Battery storage.
Solar water heating.
Super-efficient rocket stoves for cooking, heating, and hot water, potentially integrated into a district heating system.
Micro-hydro or small-scale wind generation where site conditions allow.
Fossil fuel policy
The proposal assumes:
No fossil fuel heating systems.
Shared electric community vehicles.
Progressive replacement of fossil fuel tools with electric alternatives.
Limited use of essential machinery where significant labour-saving benefits justify it.
Biomass
Wood and other biomass would be managed carefully:
Wood fuel used only in highly efficient rocket stoves and masonry heaters.
Ceremonial fires retained for celebrations and community gatherings.
All wood sourced from carefully managed on-site or local woodland.
Energy governance
An energy working group would:
Maintain and optimise the energy systems.
Make energy accounting transparent and visible.
Regularly review emerging technologies.
Develop educational resources for residents and visitors.
The intention is to create comfortable living conditions while dramatically reducing ecological impact and dependence on external energy systems.
Technology
A balanced approach
Much like the energy policy, the technology policy combines thoughtful restraint with intentional adoption. Rather than embracing or rejecting technology by default, the proposal evaluates technologies according to their genuine contribution to community wellbeing, ecological integrity, and quality of life.
Labour-saving technologies
The proposal supports the mindful adoption of labour-saving devices where they significantly enhance quality of life or reduce unnecessary physical strain. Priority is given to robust, repairable technologies with minimal environmental impact.
Community ownership of certain tools and appliances (for example washing machines, power tools, and tractors) reduces overall consumption while ensuring shared access.
Digital technology
Digital technologies would be used purposefully, with clear boundaries to prevent them from dominating community life.
Wi-Fi would be limited to private spaces and the communal office/digital hub.
Communal spaces would be designated as screen-free zones, either permanently or during agreed periods, to encourage face-to-face interaction.
Communication infrastructure
The proposal assumes reliable internet access for essential services, remote work, education, and emergency communications. Shared communication facilities would also be available for those wishing to reduce their reliance on personal digital devices.
Technology assessment
When considering new technologies, the proposal evaluates them against criteria including:
Ecological footprint (embodied energy, recyclability, and energy consumption).
Repairability and expected lifespan.
Genuine contribution to community wellbeing.
Availability of lower-tech alternatives.
Technology-free spaces
The proposal also explores the possibility of designating certain places and times as entirely free from digital technology, creating opportunities for deeper nature connection, mindfulness, and unmediated human interaction.
Overall, the aim is to create a settlement in which technology serves human needs and ecological values, rather than shaping behaviour through uncritical adoption.
Transport
Sustainable mobility
The transport strategy aims to dramatically reduce carbon emissions while strengthening connections with the surrounding area.
The exact arrangements would depend upon the location of the settlement. Ideally, sites would lie within comfortable walking and cycling distance of a nearby town or village. Within this context, the proposal explores a mobility strategy based around four principles:
Reducing overall travel demand through thoughtful settlement design.
Sharing transport resources wherever possible.
Strengthening integration with the surrounding community.
Prioritising accessibility for all mobility levels.
Car reduction
Rather than each household owning a vehicle, the proposal assumes approximately four shared electric vehicles for the settlement (around one vehicle per eight adults), including:
A small electric van for deliveries.
Two compact electric cars.
An accessible electric minibus for group travel and wider community use.
Active transport
The proposal includes:
An all-weather network of footpaths.
Covered bicycle storage.
A shared fleet of cargo bikes and electric-assist bicycles.
A bicycle maintenance workshop.
Public transport integration
Where possible, the proposal seeks to:
Work with local authorities to establish a nearby bus stop.
Create an attractive sheltered waiting area.
Align community transport with local services and market days.
Visitors
Visitors would be encouraged to arrive without private cars through:
Clear public transport information.
Collection from nearby railway stations where practical.
Incentives for low-carbon travel to courses and retreats.
The broader intention is to ensure that the settlement’s transport systems strengthen, rather than isolate, its relationship with the surrounding area.
Business activities
The proposal explores a diverse portfolio of place-based enterprises capable of supporting both the community’s economy and its wider social and ecological aims.
The primary enterprise is a thoughtfully designed eco-tourism site comprising six roundhouse sleeping pods constructed using the same natural building principles as the wider settlement. Positioned in a peaceful part of the site, the eco-tourism area provides guests with privacy while remaining closely connected to community life. The visitor experience could include guided nature walks, practical workshops, and optional shared meals.
Based on comparable businesses, the proposal assumes that the eco-tourism enterprise could generate approximately £120,000 net income annually, covering a significant proportion of communal operating costs.
Additional enterprises include:
Educational workshops and courses in permaculture, natural building, land-based skills, and related subjects.
Nature-connection retreats.
A natural building enterprise creating low-impact buildings for clients beyond the settlement.
Food and craft production.
Taken together, these enterprises aim to generate approximately £200,000 annually, supporting community infrastructure, ecological restoration, and universal basic services while creating meaningful livelihoods rooted in place.
Rather than maximising financial growth, the emphasis is on creating an environment of financial sufficiency in which other forms of wealth can flourish.
External work
To maintain community cohesion and ensure sufficient time for communal responsibilities and leisure, the proposal explores limiting external employment to a maximum of around 10 hours per week. The intention is to balance individual career pursuits with the community’s need for active participation and commitment to the principles of slow living.
Members would contribute 10% of their income from external work to a communal fund. This fund would be used to enrich both the cultural life of the settlement and that of the wider local community through celebrations, creative projects, and social and educational outreach. In particular, it would support initiatives that strengthen connections between the settlement and its surrounding area.
External work that aligns with the values of the settlement, or that brings useful skills, experience, or relationships back into community life, would be especially encouraged. Remote working arrangements would be supported through the shared digital hub.
The proposal assumes that this policy would be reviewed periodically to ensure it continues to support both individual wellbeing and collective flourishing, while remaining flexible enough to accommodate seasonal work, career transitions, and changing personal circumstances.
Wider community integration
The proposal assumes that any settlement of this kind should become an active and contributing member of the wider local area, rather than an isolated enclave. Successful integration requires intentional effort and mutual benefit.
Key aspects of this approach include:
Regular open days and seasonal celebrations welcoming neighbours and local residents.
Active participation in local governance and community initiatives.
Partnerships with local organisations to share knowledge, skills, and resources.
A dedicated community liaison role responsible for maintaining positive relationships with neighbours, local businesses, and governing bodies.
The proposal also explores formal partnerships with local schools and colleges, providing educational visits and hands-on learning opportunities in sustainable living. These relationships could extend to adult education through collaboration with local organisations.
Community enterprises would be designed to complement rather than compete with existing local businesses, seeking to fill gaps in the local economy rather than duplicate existing provision.
The proposal further explores a Local Circular Economy Policy, with a commitment to sourcing at least 80% of materials, food, and services from within a 30-mile radius wherever possible. This approach seeks to:
Strengthen the local economy by keeping wealth circulating locally.
Build resilient supply chains that are less vulnerable to global disruption.
Reduce carbon emissions associated with transport.
Support local farmers, craftspeople, and independent businesses.
A database of local suppliers and their sustainability credentials would support this approach, with procurement giving preference to organisations demonstrating strong environmental and social values, particularly community-owned or cooperative enterprises.
Through these measures, the proposal aims to explore how land-based settlements might contribute not only to their own flourishing, but to the regeneration of the wider places in which they are rooted.
Buy-in & ownership
The buy-in model is deliberately designed to ensure accessibility across a wide range of economic circumstances.
Rather than setting a single buy-in price that would exclude many people, the proposal explores a redistributive model in which those with greater financial resources contribute more, enabling those with fewer resources to participate fully. This recognises that wealth distribution in contemporary society is deeply unequal, often through no fault of individuals, and asks whether intentional communities might actively counteract, rather than reproduce, those inequalities.
Crucially, regardless of financial contribution, every household would hold equal rights, equal voice in governance, and equal access to community resources. Economic diversity therefore need not translate into unequal power, while participation remains genuinely accessible to younger people, those without inherited wealth, and others who might otherwise be excluded from land-based living and home ownership.
Buy-in
Current estimates suggest that acquiring suitable land and creating the homes and shared infrastructure described in this proposal would require total capital in the region of £2–2.5 million, depending on land values and final construction costs.
One possible financing model is a tiered buy-in structure in which:
5 households contribute £200,000+ each.
5 households contribute between £50,000–£100,000.
5 households contribute between £0–£50,000.
Under this model, total household contributions would amount to at least £1.25 million:
5 households at £200,000+ = at least £1,000,000.
5 households at £50,000–£100,000 = at least £250,000.
5 households at £0–£50,000 = up to £250,000.
The final figure could be considerably higher depending on the contributions made by higher-income households. The intention, however, is to make the lower tier as accessible as possible.
The remaining capital requirement could potentially be met through a combination of:
Grant funding for ecological restoration and infrastructure.
Wider grant funding for community development.
Ethical mortgage arrangements through organisations such as Triodos or Ecology Building Society.
Community investment schemes.
Other forms of creative finance.
Ownership
The proposal assumes that the land would be held by a Community Land Trust established for the purpose.
Community infrastructure would be owned by a housing co-operative leasing the land from the CLT on a long-term basis.
Household buy-in would provide membership of the co-operative, securing occupancy rights to a private home and plot alongside shared use of the wider land, buildings, and infrastructure.
Regardless of financial contribution, every household would participate as an equal member of the co-operative, sharing equal rights to community resources and equal weight in governance.
More specifically, each household’s share would entitle them to:
Their private home and plot.
Shared use of all community infrastructure.
Full participation in community life.
A fair share of community resources, including food, fuel, energy, and income generated by community enterprises.
Equal participation in governance.
Exit arrangements would be structured to maintain long-term affordability while ensuring fair compensation for departing members, with buy-back at the original contribution plus inflation.
Overall, this ownership model seeks to balance long-term affordability, security of tenure, economic diversity, and genuine equality between households.
Open questions
This proposal is offered as a contribution to an ongoing conversation rather than as a finished blueprint.
Many aspects remain provisional, and there are undoubtedly important questions, trade-offs, and practical challenges that have not yet been fully resolved. Every landscape, community, and cultural context will present its own opportunities and constraints, and any successful settlement will need to respond to those particular conditions.
Rather than prescribing a single model, the intention is to offer one coherent synthesis of many existing ideas, and in doing so to create something that can be questioned, adapted, improved, and, ultimately, tested in practice.
I hope the proposal serves as a useful starting point for further thinking and experimentation, and that it continues to evolve through the experience and insights of others working towards similar aims.
Collaboration
If this proposal resonates with you, I’d love to hear from you.
I’m particularly interested in connecting with people working in natural building, agroecology, planning, ecology, governance, finance, land justice, community development, regenerative design, and other related fields. Whether you have practical experience, constructive criticism, relevant precedents, or simply a different perspective, I’d genuinely value the conversation.
I’m also looking for collaborators to help develop this work into a fully illustrated design publication: a more rigorous and comprehensive resource bringing together drawings, diagrams, ecological modelling, financial analysis, case studies, and the many refinements that emerge through dialogue and practical experience. If you’re interested in contributing to that process—or helping to fund it—I’d be delighted to hear from you.
Most of all, I’m interested in helping bring a settlement like this into being.
If you’re a landowner, community organisation, local authority, philanthropic funder, values-led developer, or prospective founding group exploring the creation of a land-based community, I’d love to explore what might be possible together. I see my role not as implementing projects myself, but as contributing design thinking, systems integration, and long-term vision to collaborative teams capable of turning ideas like these into living places.
If you’d like to offer feedback start a conversation re collaboration, you can email me at james@landbasedliving.com
