Thank you for coming to see us. You are truly welcome here. Whether you’re here for a few hours, a day or longer, you may be interested in gaining an insight into who we are. You can simply walk around the public places and spaces, enjoy the Phoenix Shop or the Café, partake in a guided Park Tour, or join the Short Term Guest Programme. And if you have longer, you can join our Experience Week, starting most Saturdays. For more details, enquire at the Visitor Centre or contact us as indicated on Page 33.

This little book was created with several purposes in mind. If you have heard or read about the Findhorn Foundation Community, then we hope it will provide a concise and relatively up-to-date picture of what it’s like here and what there is to see and do. More than just a guide, it also seeks to explain a little of the purpose and philosophy behind many aspects of community life, hopefully conveying a flavour of what it’s like to live and work here. It also aims to be a Guide and a souvenir for you, our visitor, helping you to find your way around through a Self-Guided Tour, while at the same time providing a little history of the past almost 60 years that the Community has been in existence.

No matter how long your visit, we very much hope you will enjoy your stay.

Please remember that the community you see around you is a work in progress, an ongoing experiment, and is not a finished product. It is more than the buildings; it is also the trees and gardens lovingly planted and nurtured in cooperation with nature, and also the people. You are very welcome to explore the community, enjoy the gardens and chat with us. We ask you please to respect the privacy of residential homes.

See full map below

Begin your tour at the Visitor Centre (1). At a slow walking pace the tour will take at least an hour, bringing you back to the starting point. The Visitors Centre itself is where community founder Eileen Caddy spent time in meditation in the early days of the community. Opposite the Visitors Centre is the Phoenix Shop (2), a community-owned shop and a specialist retailer for the local region. It is famous for its selection of food, books, crafts and gifts. The wide road outside the shop, still called the Runway, was once part of the former Royal Air Force base next door.

As you leave the Phoenix, turning right and walking up the Runway, there is the Village Green (3), a place for children and adults to play or just enjoy the sun. We also gather on the Village Green to dance and for festive occasions throughout the summer. The two buildings on the Village Green with turf roofs are the Guest Lodge on the left and the Youth Building on the right, both built by residential building schools and volunteer labour.

The Youth Building (4) is the home of Children and Youth in Community (CYC), empowering young people, serving families and offering school holiday programmes. It was fundraised for and built by the Foundation with youth involvement. The two-storey wooden building behind the Guest Lodge is a private home constructed from a kit made in Finland. It is highly insulated and was fast to erect, but cost about the same per square metre as other ecological buildings here. In front of this house is Moonlight, a 15-sided experimental wooden structure built on a caravan chassis. Built in 2007 and costing just £18,000, it covers an area of just 30 square metres and is home for one staff member of the Foundation.

The Guest Lodge (5) was built in 1992 and can accommodate 16 guests. It was constructed using the ‘breathing wall’ technique, which allows air to move through walls and insulation, removing moisture without the loss of heat. Natural and nontoxic materials have been used throughout and the walls are clad in locally grown timber and insulated with recycled paper. The turf roofs were a creative way to add green space and wildflowers, and improve insulation. They only need to be mowed once or twice a year and have been very successful.

Across from the Village Green on the other side of the Runway, just past the Visitors Centre, you are welcome to enter the little gate that leads into the garden of the Community Centre (6), which is a kitchen, dining room, lounge and a space for meetings and social occasions for residents and guests of the Findhorn Foundation. It is a private facility – we ask that you do not enter the building.

The Community Centre was built in 1969 when Eileen Caddy received guidance for the community to build a central kitchen to cater for 200 people and a dining room big enough to seat 70 people, even though at that time the community had only 10 permanent residents. In the same year the community grew to 45 residents and received hundreds of visitors, and within a year the dining room was too small and an extension was added. From 1987 to 1989 a further extension was built. Andrew Yeats, then a student architect and now well known in the UK as an eco-architect, suggested a 12-sided shape and the use of recycled telephone poles for the main structure. The building is highly insulated, including argon gas-filled windows, and has a 12-square metre solar heating system on the kitchen roof.

With the Community Centre on your right, walk around the side of the building, past the kitchen entrance, and across a small road. The house immediately on your left is Cornerstone (7), the former home of Eileen Caddy. Cornerstone was one of the first ecohouses to be completed in The Park, built for Eileen by her sons David and Jonathan in 1990. Following the gravel path past Cornerstone you will see an old fashioned, green painted caravan to your right. This is the Original Caravan (9) where Eileen, Peter and Dorothy first settled, with Eileen and Peter’s three young sons. They lived in this tiny space from 1962 to 1969. The Original Caravan was extensively renovated and is now used as offices.

See full map below

The Original Caravan is surrounded by the Original Garden (12) where the founders of the community first grew vegetables and Dorothy Maclean began to communicate with the intelligence of nature. By following instructions, the garden produced amazing results and became famous, demonstrating what can be achieved when we listen to, and cooperate with nature. This area was originally sand dunes, transformed into productive and beautiful gardens by love, joyful hard work and good compost. It is still used to produce vegetables for the community’s kitchen. You are welcome to have a look around: remember to close the deer gates.

At the bottom of the Original Garden is The Hollow (11), an open air sanctuary laid out by David Spangler in 1993 and where one of the seats is dedicated to the memory of Peter Caddy. In summer, meditations and blessing ceremonies are held here.

On the other side of the open air sanctuary, on the slope rising towards the beech hedge, is a Wild Garden. This area of the garden is left to grow undisturbed to provide a place in the garden where nature spirits are left entirely to themselves. The Wild Garden is occasionally tidied up, and this is done in attunement and cooperation with nature.

The next building on your right after the Original Caravan is the Main Sanctuary (10), the community’s principal meditation room, built in 1968. This is where, in the early years, guidance received by Eileen would be shared with the whole community. The room is very simple, the only decoration being a woven Sunrise panel that was given to the community in 1968 by Donavourd Weavers from Pitlochry in Scotland. Three regular meditations are held daily, beginning with the early morning meditation at 6.30am. The Sanctuary is open to everyone for quiet time and meditation unless the red light above the door is on, indicating a group meditation is in progress, at which time you are asked not to enter. You are welcome to attend the daily community meditations – please remove your shoes. There is a timetable on the wall of the anteroom, next to the Sanctuary door.

Coming out of the Sanctuary, walk straight ahead past the Education building, which has a ‘Quiet’ sign on it, and turn right, and then immediately right again, onto the road with hedges on both sides. A short detour along the gravel path on the right, before the wide path on the left leading to the Universal Hall, will take you into the Central Area of seven cedarwood bungalows (13), set in mature gardens. These were built in 1968 in response to guidance received by Eileen and most of them now serve as accommodation for guests on the Foundation’s residential programmes. If you take this detour, you need to retrace your steps back to the road between the beech hedges.

See full map below

From the road take the wide gravelled path to your left, leading to the Universal Hall.

On the left hand side, in a beautiful garden, is the Park Building (14). This traditional stone building used to be the residence of the owners of the Caravan Park and was donated to the Foundation in 1971 by Pauline Tawse, a then Trustee of the Foundation. The Park Building is the home of Findhorn Foundation College and has a large meeting room, a sanctuary and offices.

Biomass boiler

Beyond the Park Building on the left is a small building housing a 200 kW Biomass Boiler (15). The boiler and heating system was installed in The Park in 2010 and provides heating for the Park Building, Universal Hall, Central Area bungalows, Cornerstone and the Community Centre. It is fuelled by woodchips that are sourced locally, and reduces our dependency on oil and gas while lowering our carbon footprint by a further 100 tonnes per year. The Foundation received funding from Community Energy Scotland and a loan from The Energy Saving Trust to install this system.

Universal Hall. Photo: Graham Meltzer

Across from the Park Building is the Universal Hall (16), designed by a team led by architect George Ripley and built predominantly by the voluntary labour of Findhorn Foundation residents and guests. During the nine years of its construction, from 1974 to 1983, thousands of people gave their time, energy and creativity to produce a building both practical and beautiful. The stained glass front windows and the main doors with their angel wings of stained glass were designed by James Hubbell, a visionary artist and architect from San Diego, California. The patio with its mosaic, echoing the door design, was created in 1996 by Cecilia Stanford. The stonework in the walls of the building itself is a work of art, from the River Findhorn mural at the back of the building to the perfectly shaped and fitted sun and chimney at the front. Much of the stone came from Hopeman, a coastal town ten miles east of Findhorn, and was shaped and fitted by hand without the use of mortar. The Hall roof was restored in 2007 in a community-wide project, and the new ‘living roof ’ of sedum is anticipated to last 60 years.

At the heart of the five-sided Universal Hall is a unique auditorium, one of the foremost entertainment facilities in northeast Scotland, hosting many conferences, workshops, community meetings, live-streamed talks and events and the best of Scottish and international theatre, music, films and dance. The 300-seat theatre is equipped with professional lighting and sound systems. The spiralling wood sculpture in the auditorium is framed by two enormous canvasses painted by the late Haydn Stubbing showing the moods of the Scottish landscape.

Circle Dance. Photo: Hugo Klip

The Universal Hall is also home to a dance and drama studio, a recording studio, a music practice room, offices, a meditation room and an outdoor hot tub. Most Wednesday nights from 7.30 to 9.30 you are welcome to join an evening of Sacred Dance and learn simple circle dances from around the world. For current classes and events in the Hall please see posters and notice boards.

Another important part of the Hall is the Phoenix Café (16). Serving light meals and snacks in a relaxed atmosphere from organic, locally-sourced produce wherever possible, the café is also a gallery space for local artists and a bar for Hall events.

In front of the café, the wooden building houses Big Sky Print (17), awarded the prestigious ISO14001:2005 standard for environmental management. The company has invested in greener technologies in their printing processes, reduced usage of harsh chemicals for cleaning the presses and increased their use of recycled and Forest Stewardship Council approved paper which is produced using sustainable methods.

See full map below

Retracing your steps and then walking down the gravelled path away from the Hall, you are now standing at the top end of the Runway. Behind you are ten acres of land with 25 eco-homes known as East Whins (56) co-housing cluster, including the Claysongs pottery (58). Beyond these, looking out towards the dunes is an estate of 380 acres purchased in 1997 by Duneland Ltd, a community company formed for that purpose. The land stretches from the edge of the developed area of The Park to the sea, and consists of magnificent open dunes, a large area of gorse and heather, and pine plantations. Duneland Ltd donated more than half of its land to the Findhorn Dunes Trust to extend the local nature reserve and protect the fragile dunes ecosystem as an undeveloped natural area.

On your left are the offices of Trees For Life (53), an award-winning charity originally formed within the Findhorn Foundation that became independent in 1993. Trees for Life works to save and restore Scotland’s Caledonian Forest, and is reforesting large areas of the Scottish Highlands in Glen Affric and Glenmoriston, bringing back the native trees and the wildlife dependent on them. Most of the reforesting work is carried out by volunteers who join conservation work days and weeks during spring and autumn. An electric vehicle charge point is located here, and next to Trees For Life is the new Findhorn Hive social enterprise hub (65).

Opposite Trees for Life is West Whins (54), a development which includes privately owned houses and flats, and six affordable housing units developed by the Park Ecovillage Trust and supported by a grant from the Rural Housing Fund, a Scottish Government initiative.

Continue on towards the back gate of Cullerne Garden (20). If you visit, please be sure to close the gate carefully behind you. These seven acres of land include vegetable fields, flowers, herbs, fruit, woodland, and one acre of land covered in polytunnels. Only organic methods are used to grow up to 30 different vegetables throughout the year for the community’s kitchen.

Cullerne Garden is a popular destination for many of the Foundation’s guests where there are ample opportunities to work with nature. It is also a venue for harvest festivals and other seasonal community celebrations. You are welcome to visit the gardens and experience the quiet peace of a place dedicated to organic growth and an appreciation of nature. Cullerne House (21) is the home of Findhorn Flower Essences, and is not open to the public.

Returning to the top of the runway, with your back to East Whins, turn left and walk along the road with private ecohouses on the Field of Dreams to your right, and the woods on your left. To your right are two grassy banks that are a type of ecological building called Earth Ships. Constructed of recycled tyres filled with rammed earth and then covered with turf, they were built in 2002 and house our electricity transformers.

Continue along this road until you reach a crossroads; you are now entering the area of The Park called Pineridge. In front of you on the left is Rose Cottage, one of the few former Royal Air Force buildings still on site and now Foundation accommodation.

Straw Bale House

On the corner to your left, with the blue roof, is the Straw Bale House (23), the first of its kind in Scotland to be built as a family home. Constructed in 2002 by local builders, it is a timber frame, post and beam structure with straw bales serving as excellent infill insulation, finished inside and outside with lime mortar. The straw bales provide insulation and also allow the construction of ‘breathing walls’.

Building the Straw Bale Shed

Turning left at the corner, walking along the road with the greenhouse on your right, next on the right is the Straw Bale Shed (25), the first straw bale building constructed in The Park. The main construction work was done by participants in the Foundation’s Ecovillage & Sustainable Communities Conference in 1995, and the building now serves as both a gardeners’ tool shed and a demonstration of the viability of straw bale construction.

See full map below

On your left is Pineridge West (26), a development of high specification ecomobile houses providing accommodation for long-term Findhorn Foundation staff. Each unit can house two individuals or a couple, with shared kitchen facilities in the central area of the building. If you follow the road around the bend to the right, on the left hand side are a row of individually designed ecomobiles (28), each built on top of an old caravan chassis. These buildings can be moved to anywhere on The Park as needed, and are much more energy efficient than a caravan.

The first permanent house you come to on your right, just before the road bends to the right, is Santiago, with a curved roof covered in sedum plants. Built in five months in autumn 2007, a large proportion of the cost of this house was raised by David Fulford, a longstanding member of staff who ran marathons and walked the Santiago de Compostela trail for sponsorship towards building costs.

Bag End 2

At this point on your left is a cul-de-sac of timber houses, known as Bag End (29), a mixture of private homes as well as houses owned by the Findhorn Foundation. The building of these high specification ecological houses was begun by the Foundation in 1990 and generously sponsored by private companies interested in supporting ecological development. Most of the houses on the left were built with the help of Building Schools, programmes run by the Foundation to teach ecological construction techniques to people who had no experience of building. The houses have many ecological features, including breathing walls, solar heating systems, high levels of insulation, nontoxic organic paints, wood preservatives and glues, and the use of local timber, stone and tiles. Bag End 9/10, on the right, accommodates eight people sharing a common kitchen and living area, while most of the other houses are family homes. The most recent building is Bag End 2/3, the first house on the left, built in 1998 and the most energy efficient of the Bag End houses.

Bag End

Back on the main Pineridge road, as you walk further you will see on your left the Barrel Cluster (30), an innovative group of round houses constructed of recycled whisky vats made in the 1920s and used in a local distillery for about 60 years. The finished homes are works of art, offering a unique experience of living in the round and still doing their job as ‘spirit receivers’ in a whole new way! The so-called ‘Barrel Houses’ were first conceived by community resident Roger Doudna who came upon these old Douglas Fir vats at a cooperage in Craigellachie on the Spey River in the heart of Scottish whisky country. Having obtained planning permission, he built the first and smallest one, at only 26 square metres, in 1987.

Craig’s barrel house. Photo: Carlos Fresneda

The building proved to be very popular and two more barrel houses were built in 1990, with roofing variations and extensions to provide more living space. The two most recent barrel houses include stonework, a greenhouse and a turf roof. Just to the south of the barrel houses is the Permaculture Demonstration Area (63), where this technique for designing sustainable human settlements is taught and developed.

Barrel Houses

If you follow the path through the Barrel Cluster it will take you along the edge of the woods to the Wind Turbines (32). (You can also get to the beach this way, by turning left at a post before you get to the turbines and then walking straight on.) The first wind turbine, erected in 1989, was decommissioned in 2017. The three remaining turbines were erected in 2006 by Findhorn Wind Park Ltd. On average the three turbines produce as much electricity as the community uses. As the wind fluctuates electricity is both imported from, and sold back to, the National Grid.

As you leave the Barrel Cluster, the first road to your left leads to a co-housing development, called Soillse (31) on the eastern boundary of The Park. In February 2010, residents built six ecohouses, creating a further demonstration of social and ecological sustainability through shared facilities and permaculture treatment of the land.

Beyond Soillse is land managed by Findhorn Hinterland Trust, a local charity working on ‘wild’ land to promote conservation, education, the building of local community and the provision of recreational facilities and activities. They also manage Wilkies Wood Green Burial Ground nearby, a place for simple eco-friendly community burials.

See full map below

As you continue along the main road on the south side of Pineridge, on your right you will come to the first of the Studios, cedarwood buildings that opened as arts and crafts studios in 1971 with some still very much in operation today, selling artwork and crafts and offering many classes to the community and the local area.

The first is the Weaving Studio (33). Here, the exquisite Sunrise panel (seen in the Main Sanctuary), the Star of Bethlehem and the Crystal Light panel, are handwoven and distributed worldwide. The Great Loom that is used to weave the Sunrise panel is about 230 years old and was given to the Weaving Studio in 1973 by master weaver Patrick Lidington. You can visit the Weaving Studio on Thursday afternoons or by appointment.

The third building is the home of the Park Pottery (35), founded in the early 1970s. It is run by a group of potters and ceramicists dedicated to high quality craftsmanship, celebrating and making accessible the restorative and healing qualities of working with clay. Classes and workshops are available to people of all ages, and the pottery can at times offer studio space to skilled potters. The shop at the pottery is open all year.

The small studio at the end is the Old Art Studio (36), traditionally used as a space for the creative and artistic elements of Foundation workshops.

As you continue along the road, on your right hand side is the Family House (37), once used as a meeting space for children and families and now the offices and home of central management of the Findhorn Foundation and the Ekopia Social Investments Ltd community investment company. To the side of this building is a path leading up the slope to the Quiet Garden (59) which offers places to pause and enjoy nature in a more meditative way.

Photo: Will Russell

Leaving the Quiet Garden and turning right on the gravel path, is the Nature Sanctuary (38), built by Ian Turnbull in 1986, using mostly local and recycled materials. The turf came from a local building site in Findhorn, the stone from several local quarries and the wood in the seats and windows are old whisky barrel staves.

This wonderful building, nestled in a quiet corner, seeks to express the harmony between humanity and the Earth’s natural cycles. The huge stone in the middle of the sanctuary, from the Isle of Iona off the west coast of Scotland, represents the earth – the lines on the floor represent the journey of the moon around it, experienced from earth, over the course of a year. The Nature Sanctuary and its wonderful acoustics are also used for daily early morning Taizé singing of simple but inspirational harmonised songs of prayer from the Taizé community in France. You are welcome to enter and stay for a moment of quiet.

See full map below

After leaving the Nature Sanctuary make your way back to the Pineridge road and to the crossroads with the Straw Bale House again. Turn left into the Field of Dreams, which was originally owned by our neighbours, the Bichan family. In 1995, Ecovillage Limited bought the field with funds raised solely from individuals within the community, making it the first piece of land in the community that was not owned by the Foundation. Planning consent was obtained in 1998 and the first house was completed in the summer of 1999.

Field of Dreams. photo: Gunter Pibernik

Each house was individually designed, but all the buildings were required to pass a community planning process and adhere to ecological and energy efficiency standards similar to elsewhere in The Park. Designers were encouraged to try new and innovative ecological techniques, resulting in a range of houses that experiment with different combinations of ecological features, suited to both the site and the lifestyle of the owner. You will find a mixture of some unusual designs and some simple and elegant houses.

Ecological features common to all the homes are high insulation levels; high efficiency double glazing; large passive solar south-facing windows; fewer and smaller north-facing windows to maximise solar gain and minimise heat loss; and the extensive use of locally sourced, sustainable and nontoxic materials. You will also see a turf roof and solar panels on the Field. As our climate is cold with short days in winter, all the houses need a heating system other than solar. These include wood burning stoves, high efficiency gas and wood pellet boilers, or electric boilers and a heat pump, connected to either radiators or underfloor heating. There are a number of conservatories which also act as secondary heating systems, especially in the spring and autumn when significant solar energy is available. Plots on the Field were consciously kept small by normal housing standards to allow for larger communal areas. Apart from the Moray Art Centre, all houses on the Field are private homes, so please respect their privacy.

An important building on the Field of Dreams is the Moray Art Centre (41). This project began as the vision of one man, Randy Klinger, and today the Moray Art Centre is a resource for all the people of Moray and beyond, bringing together artists and art lovers. Sponsors of the project have included Moray Council, Highlands and Islands Enterprise Moray, The Big Lottery Fund, and Philips Lighting UK who supplied energy-efficient museum-quality lighting. Fund-raising continues, with hundreds of people making donations large and small to help maintain this unique regional resource. Moray Art Centre houses four artists’ studios, two teaching studios, and a young people’s studio. The final touch is the addition of a 37-square metre gallery space. The building itself creates all the energy it needs, utilising geothermal technology, photovoltaic cells and solar panels to provide power and heat.

See full map below

As you leave the Field of Dreams and make your way back to the Runway, on your right is a small green caravan that houses the offices of Ecologia Youth Trust (43), a charitable organisation that since 1995 has been helping to provide safe, secure learning environments for young people. Ecologia works tirelessly with the Kitezh community in Russia, and with projects in Uganda and Kenya, helping children who are orphaned or abandoned to realise their potential. Ecologia’s most recent project, Growing2gether, supports disengaged young people in Scotland. The Trust also provides cultural exchanges for young people from Kitezh and the Findhorn Foundation and Community.

Opposite Ecologia is a parking and EV charging location for vehicles of Moray Carshare, a holistic enterprise with around 200 members sharing 20 cars and 12 electric bikes using an on-line booking system and paying according to how much they use them. Vehicles include seven electric cars, powered by our wind turbines.

Back on the Runway, turn left past the Phoenix Shop. On the next corner is La Boheme (51), serving healthy takeaway food including crepes, pizzas, juices and smoothies, with outdoor seating.

Continue your walk through the Findhorn Bay Holiday Park (48) with its holiday caravans, campsite, and eco-chalets.

At the end of the Runway is the Living Machine (49), an ecological sewage treatment system. The Living Machine, now operated by Biomatrix Water Solutions Ltd, was built in 1995 as a pilot project, the first of its kind in Europe. Here, most of the grey water and sewage from The Park runs through a series of tanks where plants and bacteria break down the waste without the use of chemicals, similar to decomposition in the natural world. The Living Machine builds on the reed bed principle, but accelerates the process and uses less land. It can treat up to 65 cubic metres of waste water a day, approximately equal to the volume of waste water created by 350 people. The Living Machine is not currently open to visitors.

This is the end of your self-guided tour. Follow the Runway to arrive back at the Visitor Centre where you began, and we hope you’ve enjoyed your tour!

Changes and Transformations
2021 has seen a great many changes at The Park, and this special insert for the Visitor’s Guide has been created to update the Guide in the light of more recent events. This inevitably means that some of the details on the Map have changed too, along with the numbers of some of the points of interest. Change and transformation continue, and this addendum will be updated as necessary from time to time.

Our Main Sanctuary (10) and Community Centre (6) were sadly destroyed by fire on April 12th 2021. At the time of writing (September 2021), there has not been a decision on the future of the Sanctuary site, but on the site of the Community Centre, a Community Garden is being created and brought to life, nurtured by Community members from around the world.

Eileen told us that the Community Centre is the heart of the Community. We envisage this new garden as a part of a re-birthing and healing of our Community heart, using the ashes of the Community Centre to feed the life force of the new seeds and to take the first steps of recreating our community gathering place.

The CC Garden will be temporary – one to four years as a wide guess – so it will therefore be simple, affordable, but still beautiful and practical, incorporating all three of our founding practices in the design, creation and the day-to-day use. As a global ecovillage and as Findhorn Foundation gardeners, we are including sustainability, ecological impact and biodiversity as key factors. The Wild Flower Meadow and wilder nature areas offer simplicity for us as gardeners and increase biodiversity to encourage as much insect and invertebrate life as possible.

Our new ecological housing cluster, Silvertrees (now 52) has been completed. It is owned and administered by New Findhorn Directions Ltd. NFD provides accommodation, infrastructure and other site services in the Findhorn Ecovillage and in partnership with the Findhorn Foundation & community.

During the pandemic, the Phoenix Café at the Universal Hall (now 17) has become a popular meeting place where residents and visitors alike can enjoy wonderful al fresco food and drink along with appropriate safety measures.

It’s in fact some time since the Telephone Box actually had a telephone in it, but the box, next to the Phoenix Shop, for the time being houses the Telephone Box Library (now 22), where you can find a wide selection of used books that you can take away and read free of charge; and you can equally bring books you no longer want for others to enjoy. It’s somewhat like a library version of the Boutique.

Our Main Sanctuary and Community Centre (10 and 6 on the original Tour) were sadly destroyed by fire in April 2021. Eileen told us that the Community Centre and the Sanctuary are at the heart of the Community.

After consultation with the community it became clear that the priority was to rebuild the Sanctuary (11 on the new map overleaf). A decision has been made regarding shape, size and location, and the site has already been cleared by many helping hands. We aim to start the building work in late spring, and we look forward to the return of a Main Sanctuary to our community soon.

Meanwhile a temporary Community Centre Garden (with a water feature) (7) has been created on the former site of the Community Centre, for everyone to enjoy and contemplate. We see this new garden as a part of rebuilding and healing our Community heart, using the ashes of the Community Centre to feed the life force of the new seeds, plants and flowers.

We are also looking at potential collective ownership of the new Sanctuary and Community Centre (previously owned by the Findhorn Foundation), but developing and agreeing the most appropriate structure will take some time.

The Findhorn Foundation has held the Visitor Centre for many years. Another big step is that, since summer 2021, the New Findhorn Association (NFA) has taken over the running of the Visitor Centre, with the help of many volunteers.

A new ecological housing cluster, Silvertrees (62), has been completed. It is owned and administered by the New Findhorn Directions Ltd (NFD), who provide accommodation, infrastructure and other site services in the Findhorn Ecovillage in partnership with the Findhorn Foundation and Community.

The latest affordable housing cluster, Woodside (31), can be found in North Whins. It comprises four family units and four single-occupancy flats, and is owned and serviced by the Park Ecovillage Trust, which also owns the six flats at West Whins.

During the pandemic, a beautiful new stone floor mosaic of a Phoenix was created by many volunteers in front of Phoenix Café (18) which is part of the Universal Hall (17), a popular meeting place where residents and visitors alike can enjoy wonderful food and drinks, al fresco or inside.

Our old Telephone Box, located by the Phoenix Shop close to the entrance, has been transformed into a Telephone Box Library (3) run by volunteers. There you can find a wide selection of used books that you can take away and read free of charge, and equally you can also drop off books you no longer want to keep, for others to enjoy.

Park Ecovillage Map, 2023

Credits

All images © Findhorn Foundation and the photographers, including Adriana Sijan Bijman, Ash Balderson, Carlos Fresneda, Eva Ward, Will Russell, Geoff Dalglish, Graham Meltzer, Gunter Pibernik, Hugo Klip, Maria Groeber, Michael Mitton, Peter Vallance, Rebecca Wingrave, Sverre Koxvold, Thomas George, Yasko Takahashi and others unknown.