Diploma 2007-2009 Sussex Roots
Sussex Roots
Website:
Sussex Roots is a society based at Sussex University. It evolved from a student led campaign to create a platform that would promote practical solutions for living sustainably. The society aims to engage and educate students and staff in aspects of living in cooperation with the earth, helping create an increasingly harmonious, connected and joyous relationship with the natural world around and within.
From the website: "In this time of global environmental crisis, Sussex Roots looks to help raise awareness and stimulate holistic discussion, exploring ways that humanity may change the hugely destructive and misguided systems that are in place. Universities are integral to these systems and therefore require a huge amount of re-evaluation and conscious redesign, ensuring that future of the planet and its inhabitants shall exist in truly sustainable and abundant states.
Education is a key part of human experience; But those involved with all aspects of the modern Education system must seriously question whether what they are learning has our long term biological interests as a species and ecosystem at heart. There are many valuable aspects to the activity at Universities; The sharing of ideas, the development of knowledge systems."
More than just a garden
Personal areas of activity with the project
Facilitation / Focalising
I helped co-found the society in 2007 with Richard Perkins, Dan Glass, Romy Dennis and Koos Couvee. It was very much a group effort for the first 2 years, with myself and Richard taking the lead on getting the site developed and the students engaged via the annual 'Freshers week', which gave us the small number of students to allow the project to grow organically. Richard already had some good grounding in organic horticulture and his own permaculture studies, with I had begun to 'action learn' (this was my first diploma project!), planning our ideas together and keeping our weekly sessions fairly simple.
I felt that my experience with Trees for Life had given me a level of confidence and skill with which to begin to work consciously with a group of people. The term focaliser (meaning some one who helps hold the focus) was generally much more embodied. We were always working alongside students who were bright and full of energy, being able to grasp very quickly the work we wanted to carry out, and were fully able to feedback and alter the course of the activity.
We really wanted to make clear that the project belonged to the students, and that we were there only to support and mentor.
Richard left in Autumn of 2008 to work at the Panya permaculture project in Thailand, leaving me and a solid and growing member base to carry on the good work. The society found some devoted members who took on more responsibility, helping to share the work load and bring fresh ideas and developments into the project. We worked well as a team and for the academic year of 08-09 I felt very much an equal to the group.
Throughout these 3 years I gained some great experience in working alongside people, cultivating an understanding of how to successfully relate ideas and visions, listening to feedback and trying to keep the all important balance between order and inclusiveness.
Site Design and Implementation - Creating a vision collaboratively
Once we had to decided to commit to the project myself, Rich and Romy got together to create our first collaborative design. We saw this garden as a first step into a process that would hopefully become an engine for land use redesign across the campus, magnetising students to an increasingly expansive vision of what role the outdoors could provide them.
Artistic Inspiration - Wild Areas - Cultivation - Curves and Shapes - Infoboards - Spaces to Relax and Connect
We decided to not have a huge drive for food production to begin with due to the notorious neglect the garden had suffered from in recent years. Our focus was to create an inspirational space were people could come and be in a diverse and engaging garden, whether to relax, tend to a small patch of their own or undertake a creative project.
We tried to convey this balance in our design, as well as having a firm grounding in permaculture principles and aware design. Factors like exposure, poor soils and appropriate technology were considered and thought about. We also wanted to leave space for others to contribute and have areas that could be adapted in times to come.
We found that the implementation took longer than we hoped and so varying ideas came and went. I decided to just create my own base plan to have a personal sense of what I wanted to see and to have a sense of closure for my portfolio. But what I designed is no longer in place - new visions were formed.
Highlights of the Implementation
- Putting 20 tonnes of compost, manure and rockdust on the site over 3 years
- Putting in Apple and Plum Trees and soft fruit bushes
- Creating a Geodesic greenhouse from local Ash trees
- Building many beds and structures from timber reclaimed from campus construction
- Having local artist Rafael Berrio come and create an installation in the garden
Liaising with Staff
From the very beginning, the project had to maintain good relations with the staff at the Institution, namely head of the estates department (Andy Jupp), and later the Environmental officer (Patrick Pica) and Convenor of Community Engagement (River Jones).
We received some good support from the Estates department, being helped with practical measures such as buying compost and tools. The allotment site had been an autonomous student zone before we came and took down the boundaries, starting our experiment in communal gardening, and so having an active rapor with the campus's staff was a new experience for both sides.
We ended up meeting with Andy Jupp, head of Estates, about twice a year, discussing progress/problems and almost always asking for more resources and support. At one point we wrote a proposal with Andy's help to the vice-chancellor trying to get funding for an extension to the project, to create a forest garden on a quarter acre of wilderness located just up the field form the allotment. This exciting development is still to be realised.
River Jones was very engaged with the project and continues to work closely and enthusiastically alongside the students, helping co-ordinate many great events, tying in the gardens activity with the wider campus and city community. Rivers role and attitude was truly inspirational, giving us a flavour of what an engaged and caring person can create in the academic environment, which in my opinion, can have a danger of becoming stagnant and negatively introspective, cut off from the local community.
Film Nights - Procurement and Publicity
Over the three years involved, I tried to dedicate at least one term to having regular film screenings on campus. This was occasionally successful, bringing in a decent number of people. I learnt a great deal in this time about the importance of film choice, promotion and latterly delegation of the promotion to other society members!
I still feel that showing enlightening media is an essential activity in all sectors of society, especially in the intellectual engines of our system.
One resounding discovery I felt I made during this time was the effectiveness that film/documentary can have when delivered in an increasingly artistic way. It brings concepts and ideas to an audience in a way the information intensive documentary can struggle. As I sat through screening after screening of difficult environmental topics, I developed a new appreciation in the value of incorporating media that allowed the viewer to arrive at an opinion without having to put across a dense mass of facts and figures.
Website Design
Using basic HTML and CSS, I built my first website for the project. It was a good introduction into the elementals of graphic design and coding, allowing me to experiment and action learn with programs such as Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Filezilla and PHPBB.
I also installed a email client, PHP Mail, which was a satisfying experience, as it can be used to reach a huge number of address, in excess of 50,000 (used by Greenpeace)!
Fundraising
All of our early funding came either from the estates department or from members of the garden. We never managed to access the £4K that the Estates dep. said was awaiting a decent proposal for a forest garden, but in Autumn of 2007 we saw a link to a local opportunity:
Brighton and Hove Food partnership
In spring of 2008, after applying for a grant, we were awarded £1000 from Brighton and Hove food partnership, an NGO trying to help projects locally that are encouraging food production.
Sussex University in 2020
70% Self Relient in Food and Energy?
I would like to imagine the campuses of the future being far more attentive to the pioneering role they play in shaping humanities future.
This inevitable change is something I hope to help co-create, helping institutions such as Sussex to implement an increasingly long term working policy, going into these perilous times with a sense of positive action and awakened responsibility.
It seems such an attractive challenge to rise to, one where our places of learning not only educate us but also instill a deep sense of connection to the cosmos, feed us, energise our technology and manage the land skillful and artistic manor.
Click the PDF icon to view my final design for the site, created within Adobe Illustrator - Please feel feel to download (left click, "save as")
Challenges Faced:
- Timing difficulties - Academic vs Growing Timetable
- Lack of interest
- Site challenges
- Lack of water on site
- Poor soil
- Strong Winds blowing across site
Articles published :
http://www.thebadgeronline.co.uk/comment/lets-dig-for-victory/
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/press_office/bulletin/28nov08/article9.shtml
