Workings Behind the Project
Bit of the storyboard for the campaign video
Layout and text for crowd sourcing campaign
# What’s the big idea?
Many parents are switched on to Permaculture, “green” lifestyles and more holistic, conscious approaches to relating to life, learning and the natural world. There is now a vast array of books on these subjects, but thus far none for their children. We think it’s time to fill this gap.
These books will be the first to exclusively serve as a bridge for Permaculture minded parents to relay their knowledge and perspectives to their children. At the same time, the books will be engaging and accessible for parents who are new to, or just discovering Permaculture.
Many parents are switched on to Permaculture, “green” lifestyles and more holistic, conscious approaches to relating to life, learning and the natural world. There is now a vast array of books on these subjects, but thus far none for their children. We think it’s time to fill this gap.
These books will be the first to exclusively serve as a bridge for Permaculture minded parents to relay their knowledge and perspectives to their children. At the same time, the books will be engaging and accessible for parents who are new to, or just discovering Permaculture.
An 8 part series follows the life of Ralf and Lilly, a brother and sister growing up on their parents Permaculture small-holding. These will be the first dedicated Permaculture books for children encompassing diverse central themes in a fun way that children aged 7-10 will relate to.
Colorfully illustrated pages along with black and white line drawings throughout the text will bring characters and activities to life and principles become clearly understood as relationships between people and the land unfold through the changing seasons. There are also on-going opportunities for parents to help ground this learning practically through suggested activities around the theme of each book.
Primarily this series serves as a vehicle for parents to engage and share their passion with their children. These books allow and encourage children to explore and develop curiosity in the natural world regardless of their life circumstances. There will be a clearly instilled sense of Earth Care, People Care and Fair share; ethics which are often not found in a lot of today’s media.
# The series
There will be two books for each season, and each book will have a central theme through which Permaculture ideas will be explored. These are planned to be:
(Spring) 1) Soil, 2) Plants, Soil care, compost, soil life, soil tests, Sprouting, propagating, Observation, Planting, greenhouses, Polycultures, Foraging, Companion Plantings, Earth Care, Birth
(Summer) 3) Building, 4) Play, Crafts, Recycling, Creativity, Observing, Living Sculptures, Natural Art, Patterns, Foraging, People Care, Growth
(Autumn) 5) Harvest, 6) Fungi, Storing, Celebration, Preserving, Food, Cooking, Selling Produce, Swapping, Fair share, Wild food, Camping, Soil life, Death, Trees
(Winter) 7) Trees, 8) Water, Ecosystems, Patterns, Diversity, Edges, Perennials, Soils, Trophic Pyramids, Interconnections, Decay and Fertility
The initial book contains a large fold out Permaculture Design poster of the land and every first book of each season contains an interactive 3D illustration of the farm as it changes, allowing the child to develop spatial awareness and contexts for the narrative. It also makes story telling and the development of design ideas visual, whilst enabling parents to embellish the context and develop their child’s understanding in a way individual to them. The seasonal illustrations offer familiarity with the setting and also an opportunity for children to ‘spot the changes’, encouraging appreciation of the unique gifts the different seasons bring.
A selection of inclusive and participatory activities for parents to follow up with their children at the end of the book allows each to be re-read and developed in a new context several times. This allows the ideas and learning to be transferred to real life regardless of where and how the readers live.
There are also “try this at home” tips for applying design ideas around the house and garden related to the theme of each book.
Colorfully illustrated pages along with black and white line drawings throughout the text will bring characters and activities to life and principles become clearly understood as relationships between people and the land unfold through the changing seasons. There are also on-going opportunities for parents to help ground this learning practically through suggested activities around the theme of each book.
Primarily this series serves as a vehicle for parents to engage and share their passion with their children. These books allow and encourage children to explore and develop curiosity in the natural world regardless of their life circumstances. There will be a clearly instilled sense of Earth Care, People Care and Fair share; ethics which are often not found in a lot of today’s media.
# The series
There will be two books for each season, and each book will have a central theme through which Permaculture ideas will be explored. These are planned to be:
(Spring) 1) Soil, 2) Plants, Soil care, compost, soil life, soil tests, Sprouting, propagating, Observation, Planting, greenhouses, Polycultures, Foraging, Companion Plantings, Earth Care, Birth
(Summer) 3) Building, 4) Play, Crafts, Recycling, Creativity, Observing, Living Sculptures, Natural Art, Patterns, Foraging, People Care, Growth
(Autumn) 5) Harvest, 6) Fungi, Storing, Celebration, Preserving, Food, Cooking, Selling Produce, Swapping, Fair share, Wild food, Camping, Soil life, Death, Trees
(Winter) 7) Trees, 8) Water, Ecosystems, Patterns, Diversity, Edges, Perennials, Soils, Trophic Pyramids, Interconnections, Decay and Fertility
The initial book contains a large fold out Permaculture Design poster of the land and every first book of each season contains an interactive 3D illustration of the farm as it changes, allowing the child to develop spatial awareness and contexts for the narrative. It also makes story telling and the development of design ideas visual, whilst enabling parents to embellish the context and develop their child’s understanding in a way individual to them. The seasonal illustrations offer familiarity with the setting and also an opportunity for children to ‘spot the changes’, encouraging appreciation of the unique gifts the different seasons bring.
A selection of inclusive and participatory activities for parents to follow up with their children at the end of the book allows each to be re-read and developed in a new context several times. This allows the ideas and learning to be transferred to real life regardless of where and how the readers live.
There are also “try this at home” tips for applying design ideas around the house and garden related to the theme of each book.
# Join in
There is a lot of work involved in developing the whole series into a professional, effective and beautiful final product. We are wholehearted about making this happen, and feel we have the dedication and skills to do so. To ensure we have adequate finances to dedicate good time and resources to this work over the next 9 months we need to source some basic funds.
This support will help the project to fruition through ensuring we are not compromising ourselves by taking this on amidst our other passions, and allow us focus to complete the books within a realistic but most effective time frame. This will also contribute greatly towards material costs, research and feedback time.
We hope that you believe as we do that now is the time for this project, now is a great moment to be of benefit to children everywhere who are now finding out about the world they are growing into.
# With more?
Of course if we manage to exceed our target then even more is possible! Imagine a friendly and easy website where children could add their pictures of the activities they tried at home as suggested in the books. We could see a world-wide example of actively engaged children, their experiments and design. This would be greatly inspiring to see, and would be working with nature not against in a positive way, as the internet is increasingly a draw to many with its potential to share.
Of course if we manage to exceed our target then even more is possible! Imagine a friendly and easy website where children could add their pictures of the activities they tried at home as suggested in the books. We could see a world-wide example of actively engaged children, their experiments and design. This would be greatly inspiring to see, and would be working with nature not against in a positive way, as the internet is increasingly a draw to many with its potential to share.
Thank you very much for reading, if you want to know more, or have a chat you'll find me at www.gatherrounddesigns.com
And of course please do share us with all you know, we need your lovely networks! There are lots of easy ways of doing this, shout us out on twitter @GatherRoundPC, big us up on facebook and good old word of mouth - chat to your friends. We’ll keep you updated…
Bethany and Richard x
Below is some research on zines that I did before I tweaked this project to be a bit more of a venture than this. Thought I'd leave it in maybe for future reference though
Research on zines Jan 2012 Arts and Permaculture online Paper form would be great, But should it be digital?? Paper costly and wasteful. Recycled paper? Mah. Could reach more people as an e-Zine. But the hand passing is cool. E-zine that people can print off bits or the whole lot if they like... Idea from 'punk rock permaculture' blog. Quite like the mixture of image and info http://punkrockpermaculture.wordpress.com don’t want it to be activist feeling though, just a positive publication. Want to be a beautiful item that someone knowing nothing about pc can pick up and understand, likewise, someone who knows a lot about permaculture can really enjoy it and want to give it to people to explain pc to them. In fact it’s very hard to find on the internet art and permaculture combined. These guys have a theatre project related to permaculture. Something to look into for my other work http://www.encounters-arts.org.uk/blog/index.php I like how the pages turn on this blog, like reading articles. Could you make an amazing interactive site like a virtual mag? Html5? http://convozine.com/807-the-permaculture This site is again a good collection of information, not very personal, which is what I would like to focus on, an informative yet personal feel of a journal or sketchbook really. Yeh, guess I'm looking for a sketchbook feel, that honesty, humour and learning journey. Unlike the feeling of the zine in this article also, it has to be beautiful!! http://permaculture-media-download.blogspot.com/2010/11/guerrilla-gardening-beneath-concrete.html http://thenextsmallthing.tumblr.com/ nice blog. Artist trying to mix his two passions (see right) this is really nicely presented, mostly links, I'd like a good mix of info and thoughts, poetry etc. I think it can be mixed really easily! |
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I found this beautiful book in a charity shop. Not sure if it fits in this section or that for my workshop but it's influence will definitely trickle into my work...Similar to work of Andy Goldsworthy mmm whatch his film Rivers and Tides here if you want a chill out!
Pippa gave me a stack of these magazines. Is there anything I can draw from these? Why are most illustrations to do with permaculture not very beautiful? Surely any artist spending some time in a permaculture garden would be super inspired!!