For many years, we've received the same question again and again: "I want to start an ecovillage. What should I do"? And now, in these uncertain times when many people are searching for new pathways and alternatives ways of living in harmony with their values, we felt like we couldn't wait any longer to provide our own answer. That's why we're excited to launch a brand new learning journey to help people take practical steps towards realising their ecovillage dreams. The course fuses together decades of wisdom in ecovillage living…

GEN Europe is committed to our values of Social and Environmental Justice, Inclusion and Participation, Community and Cooperation, Diversity, and Sustainability. Based on these ecovillage values, and as founding members of ECOLISE, we hereby wholeheartedly support and share the following solidarity statement from ECOLISE (originally published here). ECOLISE states unequivocally that Black Lives Matter ECOLISE stands in solidarity with all people of colour and those experiencing racism and oppression. We at ECOLISE don’t want to go back to normal. Normal wasn’t working. The world that we imagine and want to…

When Lou and Diego of The Great Relation Films approached us a year ago about shooting some footage at the European Ecovillage Gathering in Bagnaia that summer, we were instantly curious. They'd recently launched a beautiful video of the Ecovillage Design Education course at Schloss Glarisegg in Switzerland, and their project of documenting regenerative projects around the world deeply resonated with our vision. Since then, we have been working closely with them on a project that has grown and evolved, taking shape into something we hope will spread the seeds…

Strawbale house in the Zajezka ecovillage Ecovillagers and allies build capacity through an Erasmus+ training on the new European Solidarity Corps programme. Learning never stops in GEN Europe, with members of the network regularly and energetically designing and hosting trainings to upskill ecovillagers. This time around, “Volunteering for Sustainability” took place between the 16th and 20th of November 2019, at the Vzdelávacie centrum Zaježová in Zajezka Ecovillage in Slovakia. It was a Youth Worker Mobility, financed by the EU under the Erasmus+ programme. This event brought together a diverse community…

GEN Ambassador Alfonso Flaquer reports from a trip to the ecovillages of Senegal GEN Ambassador and Elder Alfonso Flaquer has long been connected with the ecovillage movement throughout Africa. With the Iberian Ecovillage Network, RIE, he participated in a recent visit to various projects and shares his impressions here. I have just returned from Senegal where I have been visiting some of the projects that make up the Network for the Emergence and Development of Ecovillages in the Sahel (REDES). This network of local initiatives includes ecovillages in Mauritania and…

Tools for ecovillage creation at the CLIPS incubator training We need a future when we don't have to imagine. We just open our eyes. Los Portales community close to Sevilla shows an example of a present worthy of being a common future. No, the modest houses and the arid land around Sevilla are no heaven on earth. It's the community of wholehearted people that makes the place so special. The partners of Community Incubator programme, CLIPS, had their regular transnational meeting in the best possible environment. To realise the dream…