ECO-LIVING FESTIVAL HELD IN LEITRIM
By Seamus McGoldrick
“Be Part of the Climate of Change” says Permaculture Ireland, at their first ECO-LIVING FESTIVAL, in the well equipped Drumsna Resource Centre, 8kms outside of Carrick-on-Shannon June weekend, 6th – 7th last.
The organisers hosted talks, trips and demonstrations to spread the word on the real essence behind the much feared climate change phenomenon. Gatherers were wowed by advice and expertise of stall owners, children were entertained by the visiting Drumshambles Street Theatre Troupe who had travelled back in time a la Phillias Fogg just for the event. Musicians were along to keep the atmosphere lively.
“Use your materials wisely, and don’t waste it” urged longtime besom-maker Michael Hentschel, who creates and sells tools for making kindling bundles from pruning waste, from your home or farm. Besom Brooms use birchtwigs fastened to stouter poles of Ash or Hazel. It is a versatile tool for clearing barnyards or gravel paths. The tradition of the country tradesmen known as a Besommaker is a genuine one dating back 1500 years to Saxon times. Mr. Hentschel deals in besom brooms, wood stakes and line for planting neat gardens or growing shrubbery or saplings and simple garden ornaments. And when old and worn, unlike the now standard plastic pan and brush, besom items simply add to the firepile.
The festivals promotion is designed to help us relinquish our dependence on clearing houses like Homebase or Tescos garden section, that offer cheap but never sustainable superdeals. We were told we could truly come back to ourselves by engaging in traditional crafts. The experts and organisers are recommending a revivalism of some of Ireland’s oldest and best traditions and the Festival showed these traditions are alive and well in Leitrim. Lime and white washing go back a thousand years and natural linseed oil paints were predominately used 600 years ago. Gerald Greene, Dublin based artist and expert on natural paints, is one of the only people actively encouraging this practical tradition in Ireland. “The are still the most high quality, breathable, aesthetic, long lasting, cost effective and environmentally friendly paints available. The widespread use of these paints went out of fashion when petroleum based tinned paint began to be mass produced in factories in the late 1800s, gradually phasing out traditional paints.” Mr. Greene reported of the festival “It was a wonderful venue here in Drumsna, it’s great people could experience so much in two days”. When asked would there be another year for this simulating event, he replied “It looks that way, it needs to be that way. Things need to change from the slow motion we have with people starting up eco-living.”
Creators of Tripmi.ie gave a talk on Ireland’s new Carpooling website. Less is more, with Tripmi users and can join up to a carpool journey online or create their own. Other talks covered seed saving, composting and how to build your own wind turbine. New Irish company EIRBYTE installs and sell solar panels and wind turbines to power your broadband or conserve energy bills. Their talk focused on teaching how to make and install your own wind turbine. There was information aplenty on the current online organisers and innovative designers in the North West. The idea was to offer positive solutions for anyone interested in getting up and running with sustainable living. On hand were grounded plans and programs to help people see past buzzwords such as Bio- Eco- Renewable and Sustainable that are bandied about quite a bit. Trips were organised, with a hundred visitors Sunday, the Peter Cowman’s Living Architecture Centre, close to Drumsna, where all the ideas of the ECO-LIVING festival could be explained and experience in situ.
Peter Cowman, who lectures in Econospace design, has a special interest in mortgage-free self building. The Econospace design is a 25 square meter area building easily constructed for a variety of everyday uses such as a gym or office, and offers the aspiring sheltermaker a vehicle to help them realise there dream of creating their own comfortable, sustainable home. The unit can be standalone or come part of a larger building project, and because of its size requires no planning permission.
Mr. Cowman, Architect and Writer, began teaching people to build their own homes in 1989 and today runs the Living Architecture Centre that provides grassroots training to construct simple and proven timber framing ideal for self builders.
Peter and wife Alanna Moore, another expert in sustainable and holistic living, jointly run the website PermacultureIreland.ie and lecture and teach extensively here and overseas. Permaculture Ireland are facilitating summer workshops on topics covered at the festival. You can learn how to make no dig garden beds, include food growing into the home, Econospace making and Low Tech Living weekends and permaculture gardening.
Andrew St. Ledger came to the festival to give a talk on a NGO he helped set up called the Woodland League. In the last month the Woodland League put together their proposal on the future of Forestry in Ireland.
“Overall we were just delighted” says event organiser, Peter Cowman. “To get the word out on the direction we are looking in, drawing people together and staying positive.” Mr. St Ledgers talk on the Woodland League’s proposal came across as the big issue at the 2009 Eco-Living Festival, Drumsna, Co. Leitrim. Mr. Cowman called it, “Pivotal; the Woodland Leagues has an excellent proposal saying it is the forest that will nurture rural development. It makes so much sense.”
Check out
www.livingarchitecturecentre.ie
