Kit and Saara

Plot 9

We are a couple based on the Gower Peninsula. Kit is a carpenter making fine furniture and an artist; Saara is a registered nurse and currently a student in Swansea, finishing her studies in 2008. Saara is Finnish, but has been living in Britain for three years.  We are living in a small chalet in a community on South Gower, within cycling distance to the university for Saara’s studies, and partly in Kit’s parents’ house, where Kit has a workshop set up, and is establishing a business. Neither of these residences is permanent.

We are practical people with some experience of low impact building techniques and practice. We have both lived with large gardens and small orchards growing fruit and vegetables. Saara has worked on a farm specialising in soft fruit. Kit has kept chickens and ducks. We also have a keen interest in gathering and using the produce of nature.

We are, subject to planning approval, planning to live on plot 9 of the Lammas development.  We plan to build a timber framed straw bale house with an internal cobb structure, a carpentry workshop, animal housing, and be largely self sufficient.

Our plans include a combination of growing food, keeping livestock, producing dairy and meat products, building furniture and making artworks and crafts. We will be preserving fruit and vegetables for our own consumption in the form of jams, jellies, juices, chutneys and pickles. We will be making our own beer and cider. We will be making a range of cheeses and other dairy products. We will be curing ham and bacon, making sausages and smoking meats.

Kit will continue with the carpentry, running a business using wood from the site. We expect our main sources of income to be carpentry and the meat business. Saara will make soap and candles and other craftwork.

Illustrative model of plot 9