Membership - Earthseed Ecovillage

Interested to Help?

Earthseed Ecovillage

is seeking new members

We are inviting new members in 2024! We at Earthseed are looking for individuals and groups of friends that want to create land- based community together. We are also looking for people that just want to help build a utopia they can visit and maybe one day defect to!

Over the past few months, our core group has been planning how to build our community on the land in southern Vermont this summer. We are seeking people interested in supporting the project in two main ways:

Community Partners are those who would like to be involved with the creation of the community without relocating to the land. They either live in the area and want to volunteer to work on the land, or live further away and have some digital skills to lend to the effort (cooperative business management, membership process, marketing, self-governance structure, etc.). In addition to the thrill of getting to see your ideas come to life, there are a wide variety of other ways Partners could be rewarded for their contributions immediately or down the line when Earthseed has more to offer.

We are also looking for investors and monthly contributors to support our startup costs. If you have capital to lend or donate, please consider becoming a Community Partner!

Membership is for people who are interested in relocating to the land for an extended period of time. Members generally participate in the governance of the community and have the option to join the cooperative businesses at Earthseed.

Longterm, we envision creating 5 or so interdependent intentional communities on the land, each with 5 neighborhoods composed of roughly 5 pods, with about 5 adults in each pod. We also have plans for expanding to additional sites in the area.

For 2024, we are looking for members to join our pod and for already-formed pods (roughly 5 adults per pod) to join the community. A pod is considered to be a group of people that know, trust, and support each other enough to be an effective team and sub-community of their own.

For people looking to join our pod, we have a membership process in place that includes a phone interview, a preliminary visit, a second longer stay (around 3 months), and then an offer to become a member of our pod and the community.
For people who have a pod that is formed or is forming, we have a similar interview and visitation process as with individual members and can work out agreements on a case by case basis.

We recognize that people have many different living preferences and locations that vary by season and year-to-year, and we aim to create space for a diverse pool of members. So, please let us know what kind of membership arrangement you think would work best for you!

About the Earthseed Ecovillage Land

The land consists of 430 acres with a mix of old forest, heavily logged forest, clearings, a larger trout brook all along the southern border, a year round brook through the center, and numerous seasonal streams, springs, vernal pools, and wetlands.

The site is on unceded Abenaki territory and was likely seasonal hunting grounds with a frequent encampment on the Wantastekw/Lost/West River a few miles away near the Jamaica downtown. As evidenced by the many stone walls and foundations, it was home to many homesteaders in the 1800s onwards. The last farmhouse was abandoned in the 50’s and occupied by a squatters community during the 1970’s back to the land movement. Currently there are no 4-season structures on the land.

The land was purchased for the ecovillage project in 2022 by the founder, Bob. He has been working since then on cleanup, planning, mapping, permitting, construction of the central road and stream crossing down to the main meadow, and setting up a bandsaw milling operation. We plan to be off-grid in the first year with solar power and generators, composting toilets, an outdoor kitchen, and a mix of temporary and permanent structures (tents, yurts, campers, vans, workshops etc.).

The land is sited for two communal structures and we are in the process of raising funds to drill the well, install the septic systems, and then plan to construct the two communal houses (9 bedrooms each).

There is an old orchard that we are restoring and have plans for gardens and greenhouses for growing food, flowers, and medicinal herbs.

About our Cooperative Businesses

We are looking to build a circular economy by creating a hub for cooperative businesses to fund the ecovillage project and support its members. In 2024, the project will be funded by the cooperative businesses launched by the core members of the project. We are looking for future members and community partners who would like to join our cooperative businesses or start a business of their own.

The three businesses we are launching in 2024 are: