Who we are
Elizabeth
I am working as a Speech and Language Therapist in an EBD school on the other side of the bay. I am really pleased with our move up here, though I miss spending as much time with our children as I used to. I find life up here much more relaxed and in-line with our values and attitude. I love how everyone seems to know everyone else in Lancaster. I am looking forward to the day we move in when we can reap the benefits of our hard work. In my spare time I love to read, and engage with other home-educators.
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Debbie
I came across Lancaster Cohousing when looking for ‘green homes’ and wondering where to live next. It made me consider how I want to live as well as where. I have seen the huge amount of thought and work that has gone into the project, and that, and the commitment of people involved, gives me confidence. Lots of things about the project appeal to me – living amongst friends, a green community, sharing stuff, a cycle route to Lancaster, and a draught-free house – what a joy after draughty country cottages. I work in the voluntary sector - and it is important to me to choose which organisations I work for - always small, grassroots and usually focussed on campaigning. A few years ago I gave up some work and took time out to do a course in textile design, patchwork and quilting. I have carried on feeding my creative side and since then have not been able to go back to full time work -- there are too many other things I want to do. I like to keep fit, mainly through yoga, dancing, walking and cycling. I also enjoy gardening, reading, textile art and crafty things. I’ve been moving about the country a bit lately and I’m looking forward to a new start and settling in Lancaster.
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Stuart
I’m in my early 40s and live with my dog. I work as an environmental scientist for a campaign organisation. I’m vegan and have long tried to live an eco-friendly lifestyle – so moving into a zero carbon house in a cohousing community is the obvious next step for me. I joined the project in the early days – way back in 2006 – so I’m really excited that all the hard work is now coming to fruition. It’s also great to see how the project has developed. For example, now that we have the Mill building, I will finally be able to move my office out of my spare room! As for leisure, I enjoy 80s music, country walks, racquet sports, reading, politics and cult TV/ films. I pretend not to be interested in football or the Eurovision Song Contest...
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Kathy
I am a part time Sustrans Bike It Officer which I love – this means I work with schools to help children to be able to cycle to school. I’m also a Mum and I’ll be living in the project with my partner Paul and daughter Polly. Paul and I both like to cycle, run and practice Ashtanga yoga when we get the chance. I’ve been involved in the project from the start. I look forward to living in community and hope that others will be inspired by the eco-living side of the project. I’m originally from Suffolk / Essex but have been in Lancaster on and off for nearly 20 years now so it feels like home.
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Eliza
I am Eliza, Martha's little sister and I was born in June 2011. Things I like to do: ......mmmmmbooby ....mmmmmmsleep ...mmmmmmpoo ....mmmmmmmbooby....
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I currently work in environmental research, but was previously a civil servant, a travel agent, hotel receptionist. I have a large family but not in the UK, which makes me appreciate the advantages of living in an intentional community such as this one. I like getting together with friends to cook, watch good films or play board games. I also enjoy quieter time on my own, reading science fiction books, attempting to meditate or exercising in different ways. I like being outdoors and like hiking in good company (especially since my sense of direction is so poor). I am looking forward to the houses being ready so that I can meet friends on a daily basis without having to travel anywhere. ^ top
Paul
I work part-time doing cycle mapping at the moment, and in my spare time I like to be outdoors. I am also an engineer, and I like tinkering with cars and other gadgets.
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Margaret
I have had a rich and varied life, with some wonderful opportunities! Many of these have been driven by my passion for social justice, from the primary classroom to adult literacy, then a complete change of direction to popular education through community development, inspired by working with Vietnamese refugees in Scotland. I worked with some of the most marginalised communities in the country as a community worker, and my political activism centred round the Miners’ Strike, the Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign (with some time in Puerto Cabezas), the women’s movement, Greenham support groups, the peace movement and Quakers, War on Want supporting Médecins Sans Frontières, and more. I moved to Lancaster to become a community development educator and later professor of community development and social justice. Recently, I became emeritus professor, which means that I spend most of my time as an author and a freelance consultant on social justice through community development.
I have two beloved sons, Gavin and Duncan, and a large extended family. My life changed forever in 2002, when Grace was born and I became Grandma supreme! We adore each other, and have great adventures. Grace and I joined Lancaster Cohousing in 2006, when she was four years old. When Lancaster Cohousing landed at my feet, it offered me a wonderful opportunity to live according to the values that inspire my work and my life.
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Diana
I retired from wage-earning a few years ago, and am now enjoying being able to put my energy where my passions are. I've been working in the voluntary sector under the broad umbrella of community building, for my buddhist community (Thich Nhat Hanh), and now for the co-housing group. I love to be outside, enjoy practical activities, and am just beginning to explore some right brain creative stuff. I have a daughter and a son and two new grandsons, who live in East Anglia and the South West. As soon as I heard about the cohousing group, in 2006, I knew I wanted to be part of it - without a backward glance! It combines two long term aspirations - to live more sustainably, and to be more connected to my neighbours. It feels exciting to be building our community and our houses at the same time. It is an extraordinary thing we're doing - and it's a creative process, with lots to learn. That's fun, but scarey too sometimes. Learning to trust the group mind, not being too attached to specific outcomes, being able to go with the flow - these are all helpful characteristics in striking the balance between the individual, the group and the time and budget constraints of the development project!
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Rosemary
I have lived in Lancaster for a number of years with my daughter Caiti, who is now a student in Manchester and sometimes lives at home. I’ve been a lecturer for most of my life, mainly in universities at first in Sheffield then in Lancaster, and I left full time teaching a few years ago to pursue writing and research, which means less money and stress but more time and happiness. I am a Green Party member and have been an activist in the past, mainly around women's and trade union issues. I like working with other people on shared projects, as I spend most days writing on my own. My interests and activities range across Italian and gardening, reading, swimming and cycling, cooking and travelling, writing, cinema and art. I joined Lancaster cohousing because I realise that I’d reached a turning point in my life and want to be part of a community that combines working and living together with a practical green way of life. For me it offers the best of shared living combined with a degree of privacy – and luckily it was on my doorstep!
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Polly
I'm Kathy and Paul's daughter. I'm going to love living near my playmate Martha, and it will be fantastic growing up round everyone else and with such an amazing playground on the doorstep. I love dancing, reading books with mirror endings, and being the centre of attention.
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Pam
I currently work in Glasgow as a university teacher but have strong links with Lancaster, having first come to the university for a year in the early 1990s and not having left until work took me away in 2006, so I'm desperately waiting for my wonderful new co-housing house to be ready to move back to! I have for nearly 20 years been going to a cooperative community in Scotland to help with one of their annual maintenance weeks during which I really enjoy cooking vegetarian/vegan food for 40 - 50 people and am looking forward to the chance to do the same in our cohousing project. For me cohousing is about rebuilding the sort of communities that I grew up in that we seem to have lost but as I grew up near Heathrow I think, given our rural site, that I have a whole new set of skills to learn from my cohousing friends! In terms of hobbies etc I like reading (particularly crime fiction), cooking, knitting, swimming (but not in the Lune) and hope to get involved with the Grand theatre when I return to Lancaster though as a "techie" not a "luvvie" as I'm a bit of wallflower! Cohousing, for me, represents the ideal balance between my need for community and my contrasting need for private space.
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Ian
The eco side of the project first attracted me, but now I also recognise the importance of community, which includes respect for individual needs. Gardening together on site appeals, since my partner Jane and I have enjoyed some 'grow your own veg' before at home. I recently took up woodworking for a hobby and aim to continue to develop my woodworking skills, whilst making useful things, in a wood workshop in the Mill building. I joined Lancaster Cohousing because I wanted to live in a good place, and I am looking forward to doing exactly that.
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Adrienne
Why am I part of this? Because we are an amazing gang of wonderful, committed, visionary, exciting, kind and caring, stunningly well qualified people. Because I love community. Because I’d rather live together and make the effort to cooperate than live in not so glorious isolation with my own personal washing machine that just doesn’t have the conversational skills that I appreciate. There is a wide and rather random range of a journey tucked away in my past. I studied in Sheffield, moved a lot and then settled in Oxford, a city I still love very much. Time for living in more rural areas and in community began with 7 years in Findhorn and currently Kendal and the beauty of nature here. Work and learning have been broad ranging too, starting with chemistry, moving to something with more of a focus on care for others in social housing. Findhorn brought me into exploring a wide variety of approaches to life, spirituality, healing and international community. What I love now is meditation and teaching it; healing and offering it; community and being nourished by it; the beauty of nature and contemporary art. Playing with plants and textiles makes me happy too.
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Anna
I am Fiona's daughter Anna, and I'll be 20 in Sept 2011. Before I left Lancaster to go to art college last year I ran the creche during cohousing meetings and enjoyed getting to know the younger kids in the project and organising my friends to do that too. I did a one year art foundation course at De Montfort Uni in 2010-11 and am starting a Textile Art degree at Leeds College of Art in September 2011. I love doing art at home and am also learning the art of makeup and media makeup at a makeup school in Preston. I'm really looking forward to coming back to the cohousing project in the uni holidays, I can't wait to move into a brand new house and make decisions on colours of walls, carpets, curtains, and the decor in my bedroom.
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Mark
Cohousing is what I’ve wanted to do all my life, I just didn’t find out until now. I’ve wanted someone to darn my socks, fix my puncture, help me paint and tell me the best first aid remedy as a swap for me, um ... err ...being a friendly face!?! If I’d only stayed in Cardiff where I grew up I’d have had parents, grandparents, siblings, aunts, old school friends, cousins and half the village to help me get by and learn from – but I didn’t. Instead I set off to work in Italy, Yugoslavia, Germany, Canada, Glasgow and other places before arriving in 2000 in my permanent resting place, Lancaster – which is great! And moving out to Halton where it gets really dark at night; I can walk off up the river for miles; pop round to friends for a natter late into the evening, or pop into town for the night is gonna make it really great.
I’m one of the lentil munchers, but I learnt to cook chickpeas in Naples and love to cook what one friend calls ‘peasant food’. Currently it’s adding to my waistline as getting this project going has wiped me off my feet, but hoping to reconnect with my old routine of fell running, circuits, yoga and Tai Chi – some of which I hope we’ll be doing together in or out of the Common House. I also plan to laze in bed looking out onto the river with the sun streaming in through the windows, bliss.
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Jan
I was initially interested in ecohousing, but the community aspect of the project makes this so exciting. The prospect of living with such a lovely group of people in a beautiful setting was what made the decision to join the right one for us. I am an Occupational Psychologist and work around the country and often from home - which will be great overlooking the Lune.
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Lucy
I am Huw's partner and Martha and Eliza's mum. I work in the education department at the local prison. I like to keep active e.g. walking, running, being outdoors, but since Martha arrived on the scene early in 2009 my priorities have changed and my spare time is a bit more family based. I still like my music, politics, football chat but seem to be more Twinkle Twinkle Little Star than Rock the Casbah these days. I was drawn to cohousing mainly for the community aspects of the project - watching Martha and Polly play makes me realise what a great decision it was to join.
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Pete
I live frugally so don't need to work full time -- I am a nurse and am able to choose my shifts. Cohousing keeps me busy, I have an allotment and meditate an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening every day. I sit a ten day Vipassana meditation course once a year. I also help as a volunteer worker at the meditation centre so I have some experience of cooking for large numbers and have been quietly collecting large scale recipes for community meals. I've been vegetarian all my adult life and would now call myself a vegan. I grew up in Cumbria, just up the Lune, and went to school in Kirkby Lonsdale. A long time ago I cycled overland to India, which I fell in love with. I was an extra in Sir Richard Attenborough's "Gandhi" and lived in a mountain top cave with a Yogi.
I met my partner, Dawn, at a Homeopathic summer camp in the Lake District. We lived together for a long time, currently are a couple together living apart and look forward to having the best of both worlds in cohousing. It was at another summer camp, sitting by the campfire late one night, that I idly mused "wouldn't it be great if it was like this all year round? I'd like to live with a bunch of friends who wanted to be car free and have solar panels on the roof and compost toilets and all ate together and helped look after each other's children." Someone told me that I had just described Lancaster Cohousing in a nutshell and three weeks later I was signed up. Originally we only had an idea to believe in. Since then we have assembled a group which makes all decisions by consensus, bought some land, obtained planning permission, and seen work start on the site. Every idea in the camp fire manifesto is still in the plan except the compost toilets.
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Martha
I am Huw and Lucy’s daughter (born Feb 2009), and Eliza's big sister. I love to run around screaming whilst grown-ups sit and chat. I like books with flaps and my favourite person is myself. I can’t wait to be living next door to Polly and hanging out together all the time.
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Jon
I've recently gone self employed, and my main work at the moment is project-managing the cohousing project. I also do bits of environmental and transport consultancy and energy surveys of homes. I started my working life as an ecologist. In my spare time I love escaping to the quiet bits of countryside which surround Lancaster, and exploring new places on my bike. I've been getting more into running recently too. I get a lot of satisfaction out of making things happen but I easily get fed up with long meetings. I have a reputation for getting food ready quickly, but creating a huge amount of mess in the process.
I often wonder how people with children find the time to look after them and do all the other things
they do?!
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Steve
I was initially attracted to the Lancaster Cohousing project because of the low carbon lifestyle and the eco house design. I am a native Lancastrian having been born and bred in Blackpool (the Las Vegas of Northern England). I am currently working for the University of Cumbria on the West Coast of Cumbria as a sustainable engineering project manager. Prior to this I worked in the aerospace industry as a system designer and project manager of aircraft safety systems. Outside work I spend my leisure time mountaineering, both in the UK and abroad, as well as exploring the subterranean world of the Yorkshire dales. At home I watch a lot of films on DVD and have rigged up the DVD player to a digital projector and amplifier to get a cinema type experience. Recently I have tried growing a few vegetables in our garden. Potatoes are easy but the slugs seem to have ravaged my cabbages before I could harvest them!
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Bryony
I’m Jan’s daughter. I am currently studying sciences and maths at A level, and will soon be off to university. I help look after the children when we have meetings.
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Jane
I have had a longstanding interest in things ecological since studying for my geography degree in the 1970s. I learnt about Lancaster Cohousing through my friend Margaret, who has been involved with the group from early on. My partner Ian and I were thinking about building an ecohouse ourselves but lacked the skills and the time, and this seemed a good solution: building with others. We lived in Sweden for a while, where some of the elements of Lancaster Cohousing were present in the block of flats we lived in: green energy, recycling, shared laundry room, shared cycle storage etc, but there was no sense of community; the idea of the common house seems an excellent solution.
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Charles
I’m husband to Judy, who I met while working as a civil engineer in India in 1969, and since then, dad to a grown up son and daughter, and now with three grandchildren. We lived overseas much of the time from 1977, until returning to UK in 1988. I retired from water engineering as a Sustainable Development Director in 2008. This allows me to work on various engineering and community fronts, trying to act, learn and teach for innovation – for real sustainability, on climate change issues, and for better poverty-reducing infrastructure in developing countries. We’ve also been getting involved with local Transition Town groups. So the eco aspect of LCH was a big attraction; and cohousing living fits naturally with our wish to grow older in a supportive community, helping others and gaining help when we need it too. I’m active, luckily, and love wilderness, walking & scrambling. I’m trying to learn to paint, and occasionally sing. I’ve learnt that combining passion, expertise and pragmatism is what changes the world, and feel inspired by all the people in LCH, as an example of this. I believe that creating successful working examples of doing things differently is one key to change, and I would like to help and take part in LCH, as an example for others, too.
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Mac
I work as a science archivist at an environmental research organisation, and have an interest in local politics (I’m currently a city councillor) and in local history. Between them, the council, the day job and this project take up most of my waking hours. I’ve visited the Laurieston Hall cooperative community on many occasions, and the shared work that they do appealed to me, so I was interested to find out more about the cohousing group in Lancaster, and went along to the first public meeting they held. I was struck by the amount of work and thought that had been put in at such an early stage, which gave me confidence that this would be a realistic project. Now I’m looking forward to finding out for myself just what “living in community” means in real life!
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Mary
I am a retired lecturer in Social Anthropology. I like to offer occasional short courses for adults so might rent mill space for that. My hobbies are hill walking and scrambling, cycling, debating, writing, reading world history and eco-activism - is that a hobby? I lived in India for ten years including a year working at the Gandhi Research Institute in Benares. I have one son who is now a journalist in Indonesia so I have carbon footprint problems. For as long as I can remember I have thought it was mad to live either as an isolated couple/nuclear family or singleton.
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Kate
I am an artist specialising in artists books and site specific art, and I completed an MA in Fine Art in 2010. I hope to do some art projects at Forge Bank, and maybe I can involve other group members -- creating art work is a great way to bring people together. See www.artistsbooks.org. I'm also a keen folk singer and banjo player, and regularly perform at a local(ish) folk club. I lived in communities of one sort or another for 28 years until 1998. Chris and I brought up our son in co-operation with other parents and children. I have lived in fairly small communes, and I wanted a larger social group, and an organisation which was not so all-encompassing. Cohousing seems to me to be a middle way between communes and ordinary urban life, with a mixture of private and shared space. There's a supportive community around you for those times when you need it -– I hope it will be the best of both worlds. I have been a builder, conference organiser, therapist, adult education tutor, equal opportunities officer, outreach worker, city councillor, coffin painter -- and that is just the paid work.
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Geof
I am a lecturer in Performing Arts at Edge Hill University. I have also worked as an actor in repertory and touring theatres in this country and abroad. I’m currently a member of Larkin’ About, performing larger than life characters at numerous festivals and street events.
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Miles
I am a freelance software developer and a musician. I love to cook food for friends and family, and look forward to the challenge of doing this in the cohouse. Right now I live in Oxford, near my three adult children who are taking my impending move to the other end of the country with remarkably good grace. I believe that for its collective survival and individual advancement the human race has to learn to share a whole lot better than it does right now, and joining Lancaster Cohousing gives me a great opportunity to act on that belief. An eco home and a river view to wake up to each morning are welcome additional incentives.
We are not all super-green vegans. I eat meat and don't think to do so is necessarily wrong, and nor for that matter are GM or nuclear power. But an awful lot hangs on that "necessarily". I live with Jo, and the discovery that she is as committed to this as I am has added a new depth and richness to my love for her; it is also a mightily reassuring confirmation that this is the right thing for us to be doing.
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Alison
I fell for both the location, and the people, at Lancaster Cohousing the first weekend we visited. My partner Kevin and I had been talking about finding a more communal, sustainable and creative way of life for several years, and Lancaster Cohousing embodied what we had been searching for. My enthusiasm for the place and the people has only increased with each visit and I still can’t quite believe my luck in having found such an amazing project.
I have spent most of my working life as a journalist in London, mainly in television. My most infamous programme was Death on the Rock, about the shooting of three IRA terrorists in Gibraltar, which Mrs Thatcher tried to ban. Seven years ago I moved to work in communications for the NHS, and then in a University. I miss hands on creative work, and aim to return to freelancing when I move to Lancaster, working out of the Mill. Outside work I love to walk, climb mountains, run, sing, eat good food, dance five rhythms and grow things. I also have a narrow boat on which Kevin and I will make a slow transition to Lancaster next summer and moor on the Lancaster Canal, a few miles from our new home.
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Cheryl
As well as living together, Dud and I work together and run our own company designing distance learning materials, generally for large corporate clients. We’re looking forward to moving our offices out of our home and into the Mill. It was initially eco housing and office space that drew us to the project and we eventually opted to buy a house in Heron Bank, outside the cohousing scheme. However, although it’s not a requirement for Heron Bank residents, we decided we wanted to be actively involved in the project, so we’re helping with marketing the homes and planning how the Mill will run – and getting to know all our new neighbours in the process.
After working from home for over 20 years, the idea of living and working in a community is increasingly attractive. I have a degree in physics and worked for a while at the Science Museum then the Open University. I’m a part-time painter and printmaker so I’m also hoping to move my studio into the Mill when it’s up and running. I enjoy hillwalking, long distance trails, cycling, camping (in small tents or my campervan), the buzz of cities and sitting quietly in great bars.
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Jo
I grew up in Lancashire, but have been living down south, mostly in Oxford, since I was 18. I miss the north-west, and the sea, and the location of Lancaster Cohousing is one of the things which attracted me. After a degree in social and political science, I did some travelling and worked as a technology journalist before joining Oxfam GB in 2000. I do a range of online things there, and a bit freelance too, mainly in the knowledge management area, and I'm very interested in how technology can support transformation. Many of my colleagues think I'm a geek, but I see myself as a generalist who gets technology! I went part time in 2006, and completed an NVQ 2 in plumbing – I have always had a big thing about water. With my extra time I do small plumbing jobs for people I like, and work on the allotment my boyfriend Miles and I share with another couple.
I read a lot of books, and I have been writing a blog since 2002. Other things I like include swimming (especially outside), saunas (especially Finnish ones), pickled vegetables (especially Turkish ones) and martinis (especially dirty ones). As for why cohousing… one of my favourite quotes is Margaret Mead’s "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."
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Lily
I’m Luke & Elizabeth’s daughter. I live to have fun. I love to play with my friends, paint, play with my dolls and other soft toys. I love playing with Heidi & Grace, so I'm really looking forward to living close to them in cohousing.
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Dawn
My partner Pete had been involved with the cohousing project for a couple of years before I decided to take the plunge and joined in the summer of 2009. What attracted me initially was the ideal location of the site on the banks of the River Lune. Since then I have come to know the people who make up the cohousing group and feel I have ‘come home’ in every sense of the word. I shall be continuing to practise homeopathy from Buxton in Derbyshire, and have already started seeing clients at Dacrelands Therapy Centre in Lancaster as part of my transition to a new life at Forge Bank. I’m excited about the possibility of renting office space in the refurbished Mill building, and this helps with the decision to downsize from the living accommodation I have been used to. In preparation for the move I have moved to a rented house in Halton. Until recently I owned and managed The Bakewell Natural Therapy Rooms in the Peak District. I also teach homeopathy and related subjects such as NLP both at home and abroad. I am interested in walking, cycling, camping, outdoor swimming and visiting new places. I am also thrilled to be back on my bike again, both cycling to work and for pleasure. So far this has been my most significant lifestyle change and I'm very proud of myself to be doing my bit.
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Judy
I am married to Charles who I met in India where I was born. We are parents to a grown up son and daughter and grandparents (3 xs). Until I retired I was Social Worker, CAB Supervisor, Tribunal Panel Member etc. Now I have the luxury of doing things I never had time for before i.e. Tai Chi, Pilates, volunteering for 3 organisations (wood recycling, good neighbour scheme, and advice work). Besides this, I enjoy foraging, growing stuff/making things to eat and walking with our group. The eco aspect of Lancaster Cohousing initially drew me in: I thought that a zero carbon house was ‘pie-in-the-sky’ for me, but sometimes dreams do come true... The co-housing bit was slightly scary but having met the group – all of whom are so enthusiastic about making it work, that I am immensely reassured. I am also in awe of the talent and experience held collectively in the group and I feel privileged to be part of it.
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Luke
I am currently the treasurer, though that isn't my background. For 17 years I worked as a programmer for various IT consultancies, but we moved up from Hampshire in 2009 to be more involved with the cohousing. At that point, I took on the role as full-time dad, house-husband and home-educator for our two children - Fergal & Lily. We liked Lancaster Cohousing because of the people; we felt comfortable with them, they seemed a good fit for us and seemed like an awesome team - we haven't been disappointed. I must admit that I don't have much time for pastimes at the moment, but I go running when I can, potter with photography, love to get into the wilderness and look forward to having a woodworking workshop.
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Martin
Most of my life has been spent as a teacher, with interest in rural education and learning. I was born in Lancashire and feel that I have roots here, having grown my first crop of lettuce in sight of Winter Hill. An American Field Service (AFS) scholarship took me to Detroit in 1963, which provided an international dimension to the rest of my life. I married early and went with a young family to Tanzania in 1972. Understanding how technology helps determine the quality of life of rural people became a focus for my life’s learning. That allowed me to spend 16 years at the Scottish Agricultural College in Edinburgh and more recently 11 years in Chinese universities, passing on some of what I’d learnt in Scotland. Software I’ve evolved with colleagues provides a basis for optimal timing of outdoor irrigation, wherever you are in the world.
Hopefully, joining the co-housing project will allow me opportunity to interact with grandchildren in a positive way. The Lancaster Cohousing connection came about through a felt need to put into practice things I was encouraging students to do in China.
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Huw
I am Lucy's partner and Martha and Eliza's dad. I am taking a career break in order to be a full time dad instead of a Quality Manager (I can thoroughly recommend this!) We first came across the group in 2007: I didn't know anything about cohousing but as a sciencey boy I was really attracted by eco-build. However, now we’ve had Martha, I see the layout of the homes and the community side of the project as the biggest positive difference between us and a run-of-the-mill street – I just love the idea of being able to release Martha to run off on her own down the pedestrian street to play with Polly and her other friends.
I see our cohousing project as creating an old-fashioned street, where you can play safely in the road outside your house, and where you know your neighbours well enough to be able to borrow whatever you need from them, (but without the old-fashioned cold draughts in the lounge!) I love running and I sing in a couple of local choirs (there are zillions of choirs of all types in Lancaster!), and I have visions of setting up a cohousing choir and a cohousing running group.
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Fiona
I’m in my 50s, originally from Preston, and have a daughter, Anna, who’s studying textile art. I’ve worked for years in adult education, but unfortunately adult ed has been decimated, so I’m not sure where I work at the moment. By the time we move in to the project I’m hoping to have a flourishing business or a job, and I will certainly want to tell you all about it then. I spent quite a lot of time over the last seven years organizing an international tour of the drawings and sculpture of my aunt, Glasgow artist Hannah Frank, who died in 2008 at the age of 100. In October 2010 I ran away to Glasgow, temporarily, so I could finish my PhD (an oral history study of an extended Scottish Jewish family) and wouldn’t get too distracted by cohousing meetings. Why do I want to live in the cohousing project? I always thought I’d suffer from ‘empty nest syndrome’ when my daughter left home, so I wanted to have other people around me when that happened. Though I think she may be coming back to live in the project as she really likes the idea of it. I, too, like the idea of a beautiful countryside site, sitting on my balcony looking at the river – but with people around all the time. I play English, Irish and European folk music on the melodeon and Klezmer (Eastern European Jewish) music on English concertina and hope we get lots more musicians in the project!
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Dud
I work as an instructional designer mainly developing web based e-learning and self paced workbooks. My partner Cheryl and I set up our company ETS over 20 years ago. We've been based in Kendal for the last 12 years. I have a technical background, working first for Rolls Royce in Derby and then for the Rheumatism Research Unit in Leeds. I was a lecturer in technology at the Open University for several years before going freelance in 1985 and setting up ETS with Cheryl in 1989. In recent years we've tried to reduce our impact on the environment through home-working, replacing meetings with teleconferencing, no flying etc. The next step is to move from our leaky Victorian house / office to somewhere more energy efficient. We were considering self build when we discovered Lancaster cohousing. The combination of energy efficient homes, community, shared resources and offices on site seemed to meet our aims perfectly. Outside work I enjoy hillwalking, backpacking, cycling, woodwork, pubs, Belgian bars and French cafés.
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Frances
As the daughter of a travelling professor I got to travel widely in my childhood living in Western Australia, the USA and Thailand, and now have family at all corners of the world, which is good in some ways and not others. I returned to the UK at 17 to go to university in Scotland and then worked as a film/video editor in television for many years, based in London. Looking for a more sustainable way of living and community led me to Lancaster Cohousing, which I joined at the end of 2006, moving up to Lancaster soon after that.
I now mostly make web videos, particularly about any subject to do with sustainable lifestyles. This includes intermittent documentation of our project on video (currently working on feasibility of doing a time-lapse of the construction which would be fabulously cool!). I also like walking and cycling, and being relatively new to this beautiful part of the country, have many Wainwrights still to bag and cycle routes to try. I'm also looking forward to gardening and growing vegetables at Forge Bank, and hope to do a bee-keeping course when time permits.
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Chris
Born 1957 in Leicester, and a proud product of the comprehensive education system. Squatter, street performer, clown, carpenter, father, anarchist, peace activist, communard, Engineer of the Imagination, author and Green Councillor. Lived for 20 years at People in Common, a small alternative community in Burnley that grew out of the radical underground of the 1970s.
I have worked in the construction industry for over 25 years, originally as a carpenter doing house renovations and for the last decade doing project management for community and voluntary groups. I have nearly lived in some sort of communal set up for longer than I have lived in the ‘outside world’ – and on balance the benefits outweigh the disadvantages. Living on your own has its attraction, but it is not all it’s cracked up to be!
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Alastair
Hi. I am Jan’s son, I am a student in my second year at Lancaster Royal Grammar School. I live very close to the project ready for moving in. I have joined Halton’s Scouts and have made friends in the village, even though I’m a boarder at LRGS which is due to my mum working away. We joined the project through my Aunty reading a copy of the Permaculture magazine and passing it on to us. We joined in July 2010 and I think the project is amazing therefore I’m really looking forward to moving in.
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Cliodhna
What I really love is being in nature, growing, cooking and eating food, doing yoga and meditation and living life slowly, mindfully and appreciatively. All of this I do some of the time - and I look forward to doing more of it when we are all living at lovely Forgebank. I love my work designing and hosting dialogue and transformation processes and facilitating spirituality/deep ecology related courses and retreats. I am inspired by the vision, passion, energy, commitment and brilliance of my co-housing friends and am learning mountains just being with them on this journey...and Lancaster is a brilliant place to live. Mine is a pretty conventional professional background in culture, regeneration, partnerships and local government inspection but no one would guess it…
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Gill
I currently live in North East England and work as a librarian in further education, an important but often overlooked sector. During my 20+ years in libraries I've met a wonderful and diverse bunch of people that I've been privileged to help and support in their studies.
A few random observations about myself: I am an inconsistent but keen artist, love cooking when I have the time but have a tendency to use every available spoon and pot, enjoy idling but would never admit to procrastinating, am at my happiest in the company of friends and family, love listening to my old vinyl collection and have a cat.
I joined Lancaster Cohousing in early 2011. Thanks to Mac, a friend from my polytechnic days, I'd been aware of its existence for some years. I looked at cohousing more seriously after taking redundancy in 2010 when I learned that life changing events are to be embraced not feared. Well, it was either this or the fortune cookie motto I got around the same time that said, "Life is about making some things happen, not waiting for something to happen". Whichever one it was no longer matters, after Pam's compelling Lancaster Cohousing talk during an integration meeting, I was pretty much convinced this was for me and I am delighted to be part of this amazing group of people creating an intentional and ecological community.
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