Building Their Own Affordable Homes in Bristol 💪

In Bristol where I live, a community have come together - #WeCanMake - in a working class community, and taught themselves the skills needed to build their own houses. Using Wikihouse technology (basically slotting together cut bits of wood, a bit like making cardboard models only life sized and it lets you build 4 story buildings out of reclaimed wood). They've bought themselves a massive CNC machine, some land, and are about to start collectively building their first set of homes, which they co-designed, will be insulated to have VERY low bills (and carbon emissions) and are even going to maximise use of local skills (to keep money in the community) and materials. They're even testing how much of the soil they have to dig out to create the foundations can be fired into their own bricks to save them paying to have it taken away, and reduce the number of bricks they need to buy to build the brick elements (although lots of the buildings won't need brick due to the wood structure). The homes will last as long as normal homes but be far more affordable to build and live in, and will maximise the use of people power in the commuinty. This is just one example of thousands of projects like this where ordinary people are coming together to create their own energy, food, housing and other essentials in their communities, which they then co-own, and get to make all the decisions about. THIS is how we build a world that works for all - and it's entirely feasible and being demonstrated all around us, if only we know where to look 🙌