Ecovillage Action Week
Serve and Connect with Earthaven
TBD 2026
Earthaven Ecovillage
Near Asheville, NC
Want to experience community and network with community builders?
Want to learn skills, gain insights, and get to know the Earthaven community?
Want to contribute to something larger than yourself while having fun?
Join us as an active participant in the everyday rhythm of life and work at Earthaven Ecovillage!
The best way to experience Earthaven’s way of living is to pitch in and experience it yourself. During Ecovillage Action Week, you’ll work side-by-side with residents, making meaningful contributions and connections while exploring new skills and expanding your ideas of alternative living. You’ll learn by doing and getting to know the community from the ground up — and having a lot of fun in the process!
In addition to community work parties, you’ll have the chance to enjoy meals with community members and have the opportunity to participate in yoga, meditation, hiking, and Earthaven neighborhood and home tours.
As I immersed myself for a week at Earthaven, I was struck not only by the simplicity of the day to day operations, but found myself drawn, once again, to the natural rhythms and connections of community life.
Looking for more information about the Earthaven experiment?
This hands-on, service-based program is designed to follow the Earthaven Ecovillage Experience Weekend, which provides classes, presentations, and discussions about what Earthaven is doing and why. Enroll in both programs for a full-featured intensive experience at Earthaven Ecovillage.
Highlights
- Working together to contribute to the beauty and functionality of the ecovillage
- Conversing with villagers over dinner, around the fire, and in neighborhood work parties
- Touring Earthaven’s common areas, buildings, and off-grid facilities
- Exploring Earthaven’s off-the-beaten-path neighborhoods and homes
- Connecting with the natural world, including hardwood forests, creeks, and wildlife
- Practicing self-care as a pathway to rejuvenation through meditation, yoga, hiking, and soccer or ultimate frisbee
- Contributing to something bigger than ourselves in the fresh mountain air
- Learning about residency and membership realities and pathways
Community activity examples
- Community potluck
- Coffee and trade marketplace
- Soccer
- Fire circles
- Meditation and yoga
- Forest hikes and bird watching
- Neighborhood meet-and-greet
- Conversations about residency and membership realities and pathways
The Experience
Ecovillage Action Week gives you the opportunity to work collaboratively to accomplish whatever task is at hand, contribute to new experiments in regenerative lifeways, and experience the joy and satisfaction of having done so with new friends.
This experience combines your head, hands, and heart to ground your theoretical understanding of community into an applicable action-oriented lifestyle. Embody a holistic approach to living, thinking, and serving others.
Each day will feature a coordinated half-day work party plus at least one optional community activity.
Work party examples
- Preparing biochar
- Processing firewood
- Organizing the Free Store
- Tending the Forest Garden
- Beautifying the Village Center
- Protecting native habitat by removing invasives
- Helping Earthaven villagers in their farms and gardens
Program Schedule
Monday
1:00 Arrival, Check in, and set up
2:30 Welcome, orientation, and Earthaven tour
3:30 Earthaven tour
6:30 Dinner (provided)
7:45 Opening fire circle
Tuesday
Breakfast (self-prepared)
9:00 Coffee and trade marketplace
10:30 Exercise and exploration options
12:15 Lunch & Rest/independent time
2:30 Work party
5:00 Rest/independent time
6:30 Community potluck and grill (provided)
7:45 Community Connection
Wednesday
8:00 Meditation (optional)
Breakfast (self-prepared)
9:00 Work party
12:15 Lunch & Rest/independent time
2:30 Work party
5:00 Rest/independent time
6:30 Dinner (provided)
7:45 Rest/independent time
Thursday
8:00 Meditation (optional)
Breakfast (self-prepared)
9:00 Work party
12:25 Lunch & Rest/independent time
2:30 Extended independent time
4:30 Exploring Residency and Membership: A Conversation
6:30 Dinner (provided)
7:45 Open Space Programming at Fire Circle
Friday
8:00 Meditation(optional)
Breakfast (self-prepared)
9:00 Closing/Wrapping up the Bundle
12:15 Lunch, pack, and depart by 2:30
What an incredible group of people, creating so many interesting and vital projects. It was great to have a chance to participate in the actual work: to learn more deeply about what it means (from at least a few different perspectives) to live at Earthaven; and to be able to contribute, in a small way, to this inspiring constellation.
Logistics
Food
Delicious, omnivorous meals are prepared by talented culinary artists from the Earthaven community. Vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, and dairy-free options available. Beverages (tea, coffee) are provided. Participants are invited to help with meal clean-up. Many hands make light work.
As much food as possible is sourced from Earthaven and its surrounding farms and gardens, with some ingredients sourced from grocery stores. Our meals are created with seasonal, local, fresh, wildcrafted, humanely-raised, and organic ingredients.
***If you have dietary needs beyond the ones listed here, please be prepared to bring supplemental food to support your nourishment and well-being. Our kitchen cannot accommodate all diets.
*** Although we would like to know if you have any allergies, we cannot provide an anaphylactic safe meal. There is always the chance of cross contamination.
Click here for more information about food.
Program Specific Info
Four lunches and four dinners are included, Monday dinner through Friday lunch.
Facilitators
In-person Programs Director, Faculty Throughout the last two decades, NikiAnne has been immersed in community and in service to a wide range of educational endeavors focused on nature connection, personal empowerment, and community resilience. No matter what she’s teaching, NikiAnne is always on the same mission: to raise awareness of our whole selves – gifts, passions, blind spots, shadows – and help those whole selves find and fill niches in their communities.
NikiAnne Feinberg
Financial Co-responsibility and Scholarships
Because some people have more financial means than others, we have created a sliding-scale fee system to accommodate a range of economic realities. We offer several price tiers and leave it to you to select the most appropriate tier. The price range aims to take into consideration economic disparities, historical injustices, and personal circumstances. The system is designed for those with more resources to support those with less.
At Earthaven and through the School of Integrated Living (SOIL), we strive to practice a culture of financial transparency, authenticity, and generosity. Trusting each other to assess their needs, what is within their ability, and when to ask for help. We are excited to include you in our experiment with financial co-responsibility.
We are now offering self-selected scholarships for many of our programs. No proof of need, no questions asked. Just the clear intention of trust that registrants can assess whether the cost of a program is truly a barrier to attendance and the growth of self and community our programs seek to foster.
In addition, we offer partial scholarships (50% of the middle of the sliding scale) to black, indigenous and people of color (BIPOC) with financial needs who otherwise would not be able to afford to attend, even with the self-selected scholarships. We understand that BIPOC may experience more financial and institutional barriers to participation, and this is one way we are able to create more access. If you identify as BIPOC with financial needs and would like to receive a deeper scholarship, please contact us.
SOIL endeavors to support the healthy flow of all resources; whether that be monetary or the skills and information that seed cultural change; and widen the doors of accessibility to what we offer.
Cost
General
- Adults sliding scale: TBD. Scholarship: $TBD
- Children and teens (ages 4 – 17): $TBD
What’s Included
Tuition includes all Earthaven fees, program facilitation, lunches, and dinners. Camping and indoor lodging are available for an additional cost.
Participants are responsible for their own breakfasts, transportation, and personal needs.