The ideas for The Self-Sustaining Village took shape over 2002. In 2004, a group came together to buy a listed farm with adjoining 15 hectares of land, and the first shovel of earth for our own building was turned.
Today the village comprises 19 households, which include both completed houses and ongoing construction projects.
The inhabitants of the village are currently 36 adults and 40 children aged 0-18 (including shared custody children).
We share a common vision of another way of living where we take greater consideration for people and nature and common well-being. With regard to the social aspect, the basic idea is that there is life on the site, socializing across ages, and cooperation on common practical activities.
On the ecological side, we practice as sustainable a lifestyle as possible, where we are part of the solution to environmental issues rather than part of the problems. At the same time, we also hope that the project, together with other eco-communities, can help influence the society we live in.
In a village of this size there is diversity and room for difference. We want to live somewhere where things hang together - i.e. work, leisure, family, friends, children, adults and elderly. We try to create an alternative to the institutional separation that prevails in society, and instead integrate children and the elderly into the village’s practical and social life. Everyone can participate in the community and feel that they are needed. Through this we achieve socializing and cooperation across age, education and cultural background, which we consider valuable. Children are surrounded by other children and adults whom they know through their childhood, and they thus get a broader insight into the adult world than many children do in society today.
The village’s legal structure is a cooperative association. Download bylaws here: Bylaws
