Making Practices in Pursuit of Ecological Ethos: Learnings from Three Ecovillages in Australia

Abstract

Ecovillages, communities in which people integrate self-built houses, shared facilities, organic farming, composting, and self-governance into everyday practices, serve as laboratories for ongoing experiments in sustainable living. While topics like sustainability, simple living, and making are well discussed in the HCI community, we aim to investigate what socio-environmental issues are identified in ecovillages and how and with which ethos makers address these issues in their making practices. In this paper, we present findings from an ethnographic investigation around sustainable making by focusing on the endeavours of three ecovillages and highlighting their ethos to draw out lessons for HCI researchers. We discuss the relationship between making practices and sustainability from four aspects: space, material, network, and meaning, and provide lessons and implications for the HCI community.