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Collecting resources: In permaculture everything is a resource. The friends save their coffee grounds (source of nitrogen), egg shells (calcium) and banana peels (potassium) to make a rich fertilising tea to dress the garden beds. 2 Garden view: The first-year layout in 2018, observing the
plot to see what would be best plan for the garden 3 Reusing: They use recycled water bottles – they cut the top off to form a dome – to keep seedlings warm during the winter frosts, creating a “greenhouse” around every individual seedling, rather than having the expense of building a big greenhouse.
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IVE YEARS ago, Ester Kruger went on a career development course and was brought up short by the question: What would be your best life? The answer came to her in an instant – to live sustainably, off the grid, with a community of friends. She had the friends already – people she had met while studying at Stellenbosch University’s Military Academy in Saldanha – and they were of like mind. Because they were in the Western Cape, she sold her home in Pretoria, and used the money to buy a 3 200m² plot in Hopefield, near Saldanha Bay, land once owned by the town’s founding fathers, a Mr Hope and a Mr Field. Now Esther shares her home with four friends, a sheep, a handful of rescue dogs and cats and some chickens. And while only the five, ranging in age from 42 to 52, live in the Hopefield Homestead, they are part of a broader group of Hopefield residents who share their vision. At the centre of the Hopefield Homestead project is a permaculture garden – what they intend to become a food forest – “a multi-layered, purposefully designed forest of food producing species”. The friends say: “The idea is the diversity of plants creates a healthy, abundant and harmonious ecosystem in which pollinators, birds, tortoises and other creatures can also thrive. “Food forests need a clear initial design strategy and work
