Festival 2013: Programme Update 1

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Dharma Parlour 2013

The Dharma Parlour is an Area of the Festival dedicated to exploring the teachings of the Buddha and how it applies to us in the modern world. It has a full programme of activities over the weekend including a series of talks, study and workshops. You can see the whole Dharma Parlour programme as well as an outline for the Meditation Space on the main Buddhafield Website.

Highlights include:

From the Triratna Buddhist Order we have Lokabandhu, Shgantigarbha, Kulamitra, Maitridevi and Dhivan giving talks on topics from 10 Ways to Misunderstand Buddhism to The Buddha Broke my Heart; Theravadin monk the Venerable Amaranatho will be talking on the topic of The Listening heart and later leading a panel discussion on The Impact of Mindfulness; Dr. Tashi Zangmo and Marie Thesbjerg will be giving their own series of talks around themes arriving from their work with the Buthanese Nuns Foundation.

TBO members Dhivan and Mahabodhi will be leading daily study over the weekend where you can investigate two themes from the Buddha’s teaching, love as a means to Enlightenment and the Buddhist perspective on feelings and emotions.

The Dharma Parlour has it’s own workshop programme, and there’s something for everyone, from meditation for parents with Upayavira, to an introduction to Buddhism with Advayasiddhi, and an exploration of traditional “elements” meditations with Caroline Brazier.

Recordings from the 2012 Dharma Parlour

Lokabandhu giving a talk
Thanks to Free Buddhist Audio for hosting the talks recorded at last year’s Buddhafield Festival. Dharma Doorways and Deadends: not all that glitters is gold. Lokabandhu explores the fascinating Buddhist notion of “near enemies”, those seductive but misleading lookalikes to authentic spiritual qualities. Living in an Illusion … Dying to Escape: Khemasuri talks about everyday experience as virtual reality, focusing on death to turn towards the truth, and “thin moments”. Embracing Love: Vajrasara explores the joys and challenges of love, empathy, passion and compassion on the spiritual journey. Doors to Freedom: the Buddha’s Psychology of Liberation with Dhivan, author of This Being, That Becomes: the Buddha’s Teaching on Conditionality, talks about some of the historical Buddha’s ideas on how conscious awareness can influence unconscious patterns that keep us imprisoned in a fixed sense of self.

Summer Events at the EcoDharma Centre

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The Eco Dharma Centre is Buddhafield’s cousin project in the Spanish Pyrenees.

Meeting The Wild

29th June to 13th July 2013

This is a retreat with an emphasis on meditatively inhabiting the wild landscape which surrounds the EcoDharma Centre. It is part of our Nature Based Practice and Learning series. It brings meditation and mindfulness into relationship with wilderness immersion.

Our deepest nature is untameable. Yet, spending so much time living in a world constructed in service of a humanity, this can be hard to remember. So step out of the narrow dusty world for a while and meet the wild. Immersing ourselves in direct contact with wild nature, and deepening that connection through meditation, mindfulness, and reflection, can heal the wounds of alienation that are so present in our times. This helps us to re-connect with deeper aspects of ourselves and the world we inhabit – in a way that is enriching, empowering and transformative.

Permaculture & Deep Ecology

20th to 27th July 2013

This course explores both the practical wisdom and the theoretical underpinnings of a shift to a life-sustaining future – set within a framework of nature and dharma based learning. It draws together the practical wisdom of permaculture design, experiential nature-based learning, and the theoretical foundations of deep & radical ecology. It weaves together study, meditation, and hands on learning.

More information, booking details and suggested donations/dana can be found on the EcoDharma website.

Green Earth Awakening 2013: Post-event Roundup

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Buddhafield ran its Festival at The Gallops from 2001-2008. The site, a few miles north of Wellington, Somerset, features a couple of fields bordered by a hardcore track that was used at one time for exercising horses. I hadn’t been there since the last time we used the site for the Festival and was slightly apprehensive. Simon picked me up in town, but when we got to the crossroads near the site entrance, I have to confess to a mix of feelings as memory stirred.

There’s nothing quite like revisiting a place to be reminded that memory isn’t like a sort of movie I replay in my head. It plays itself out very physically. I was involved with running the Festival Steward Crew at the Gallops throughout our time at that site and each event was consistently, incredibly intense. That doesn’t mean it was painful (although there were acutely difficult moments), but the breadth of demands that had been on me personally mean that my relationship to those fields left me unsure about whether I could settle back quickly or easily.

Rocket and wood gas stove workshop with Jonathan Rouse

As we drove on site, my feeling was immediately drawn back to positive association. I was reminded of the many beautiful things about The Gallops, especially the bottom field which had been our main ‘arena’. The Buddhafield Café structure was being erected in the same spot it had been traditionally sited (Simon and I arrived just in time to help hoist the skeleton up), with it’s broad view, diagonally across and down the field. It’s bordered by a solid tree line, gradating into woodland to the north at the bottom of the slope, sheep pasture most of the year round, but in itself full of wildlife. There’re at least two substantial badger sets, and amongst the birds I even saw a woodpecker disappear into a nest hole in an old pine.

At the Green Earth Awakening (GEA) I’d agreed to help manage the Buddhafield Café alongside Ruth. We knew we were planning to run a slightly different format of Café to usual, with the shift pattern being shorter and focusing around fixed meal times (for the first time we’d offered pre-booked meals as an option on a ticket price). During setup, the Café was also anticipating inspection by Mid Devon County Council’s Environmental Health, so there was a certain extra sense of pressure. Being a field Café, and one that is fairly unique, we don’t easily fit an off-the-shelf food management model. There’s an ongoing process of reviewing how we do things, because our food handling practice requires ongoing refinement when we often don’t construct the same format of tent (we can’t guarantee the same workflow for dividing unprepared from ready-to-eat foods: it has to be redesigned each time). And of course at the GEA we’d had to take a the best part of our kit out of winter storage, so everything needed a very good scrub. Happily, our inspection went very well and the Buddhafield Café now has a very healthy five-star rating.

We had a very small team, mainly because we’d found it very difficult to recruit enough folk to help with setup. However the people who did arrive were a very easy bunch to work with and setup went remarkably well. It was a very harmonious week. We eat very well and an end-of-day sauna gave us that Ready Brek glow to counter some very cold nights. I think practically everyone was twitchy about weather, given how awful last summer had been and that we were still working around an ongoingly moody spring. In the end, daylight weather was actually mostly good, although the wind and cold on Friday was a bit punishing.

Making willow fish lanterns

Samashuri and Lila in the willow fish lantern making workshop led by Tasha Stevens-Vallecillo

But! What a lovely event weekend! Rosie’s workshop programme was a winner and there was plenty of opportunity to laze around in the sun.

I took quite a few photos and uploaded the best to a photo set under the Buddhafield Flickr account.

There were several talks given over the weekend. Lokabandhu spoke about A Buddhist Approach to Changing the World, Satyajit talked about Awakening to the Earth – An Inconceivably Vast Undertaking and Akasati gave a talk for Wesak on The Wisdom of Letting Go Revealed In the Story of the Buddha’s Enlightenment. (Thanks to The Buddhist Centre and Free Buddhist Audio for their support.)

Lokabandhu did a short interview with Rosie during the event which he’s posted to AudioBoo.

ThankYouThankYouThankYou to everyone who participated! This time next year Buddhafield expect’s to be helping organise the 2014 Triratna International Retreat at Adhisthana near Great Malvern, but we hope to run a second Green Earth Awakening in 2015.

Green Earth Awakening 2013: Update 4

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And a final update on the programme for the Buddhafield Green Earth Awakening Camp 24—27 May 2013. The weather has been pretty lovely this month and we’re hoping that it’ll bring out the best in our fabulous site, which many of you will remember as being to host of our Festival for some years. Tickets still available on the GEA webpage, where you can see the full programme. Two last additions:

Q&A on Green Wood Building

With Rob Coventry.

Rocket and Wood gas Stoves: Design & Build Principles & Demos

Come and learn about the holy trinity of wood combustion: “time, turbulence and temperature”! We’ll be lighting up rocket and wood gas stoves and discussing the simple but ingenious principles they use to harness more heat from wood (or even generate electricity!). The workshop will also touch on DIY methods and materials.

A ‘stove anorak’, Jonathan Rouse, has spent the past 12 years working on cooking stove projects across Africa, Asia and Central America for charities, the UN and businesses. He also founded Wild Stoves in 2010.

Opening Ceremony

Bring something green to wear!

Skill Sharing at EcoDharma

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The EcoDharma community are looking for skill-sharers to help develop resilience in:
• Food growing.
• Wild food foraging and preservation.
• Traditional stone building.

They are looking for people to go and stay at their community in the Catalunyan Pyrenees in Spain for up to 3 months. They are particularly interested in people with experience and/or interest in skill-sharing. In return for helping them develop these aspects of their land-based learning centre and community you will benefit from the opportunity to learn new skills and be nourished by spending time living in our wild and remote community setting.

They are hoping to be able to cover your travel costs and some pocket money (and additional finance is negotiable for skilled builders) — pending funding.

Traditional Stone Building

When? September—November 2013, or end of March—July 2014.

What? They are looking for up to 8 skill-sharers to join their building team to renovate a traditional Catalan stone building. The work will be focused at Cal Victor, an old peasant Catalan farmhouse abandoned since the early part of the last century.

This is a vital piece of work in terms of the future of the Ecodharma community as it will provide the main communal space for the community including; a living area, kitchen, office, herb drying room and accommodation.

The project will involve renovation using traditional building techniques and materials, integrated with eco-building and other contemporary elements.

Who? We are looking for people who either:
• have general building experience, or
• are experienced or interested in learning about building with stone, or
• are experienced with carpentry.

Food Growing

When? Mid-August to mid-November 2013 or April—July 2014.

What? They are looking for 3 skill-sharers to support Liam who has held responsibility for growing our food since autumn 2013.

EcoDharma’s organic annual garden was established as four raised beds (each some 30 metres long) four years ago. The long term vision is for it to become a perennial system with vegetables growing below the existing fruit trees. Their forest garden was very recently planted by a wonderful team of volunteers who planted 100 fruit and nut trees this March.

You will be supporting Liam to produce as much food as possible from the annual garden using organic techniques and permaculture principles. There will also be work helping to establish and maintain the fruit and nut trees in the forest garden.

Who? We are looking for people who:
• have plenty of practical common sense
• have some basic gardening skills and experience
• are physically able.

Wild Food Foraging and Preservation, Bread Making and Creative Cooking

When? Mid-August to mid-November 2013 or May to July 2014.

What? They are looking for 2 skill-sharers to join them foraging for and preserving the abundance of wild foods growing in their wild and remote mountain valley.

Throughout the summer and autumn they are blessed with a wide variety of wild fruits, berries and herbs as well as the food they are cultivating ourselves. They need help to preserve as much as they can for the coming year, which will include:
• Harvesting and transforming an abundance of damsons, mulberries, elderberries, figs, pomegranates and blackberries into jams, chunteys and other culinary delights and medicinal tinctures
• Foraging for, for example, rosemary, thyme, sage, yarrow, nettles, lavender and savoury to make teas.
• Baking sour dough bread and experimenting with other baking
• Using produce in the garden creatively, for example green tomato chutneys, pickling vegetables for saur craut etc.

You will join Claire and Nikki who have been wandering the valley discovering the rhythms of the land and turning them into culinary and medicinal delights; and Lou who has held responsibility for the kitchen, food preservation and baking for past 3 years.

Life at Ecodharma

Life at Ecodharma is very communally spirited and is largely shaped by a collective yearning to move more and more towards simplicity, low impact living and just being with the land. All this provides the context for a rich and nourishing learning environment and a strong sense of being very much alive …

Funding

Depending on your skills, experience and/or future aspirations you may be eligible to apply for funding to pay for your travel and some pocket money and to reimburse Ecodharma for your food and accommodation costs. There may also be scope for additional finance for skilled builders. We will discuss possible funding with you on receiving your application.

How to apply

Please email claire@ecodharma.com for more information and to request an application form. Please state which role/s you are interested in and please be sure to meet the deadlines below. These deadlines have been set to ensure you are able to meet external deadlines for funders in good time – which vary depending on the placement period.

Deadlines

30 April 2013 for placements starting in August.
30 May 2013 for placements from September 2013-July 2014.

Turning the Mind

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The Turning of my Mind.

I have been struggling with a slight case of writers block recently and finding my way into writing something for this blog has been proving difficult. I think this has been due to a lack of Dharmic input in my life over the last few months. I have forgotten to keep my eyes open to the beauty that surrounds me every day. I have been in a very introverted space, reflected a lot over my experiences of the last handful of years and have really and truly begun to reflect and more importantly start to accept those things that make me who I am. The process is challenging but innately beautiful once there is respite enough to look back and see how much life has shifted. The explanations of how this works is what I am struggling with at the moment. I either know something intuitively or I know something intellectually and words fail me on both counts! In any case that is not a reason to stop trying to communicate something that has moved me in some way.

I also attended the Women’s Mitra study week – click here for Lulu’s report – and found that it was just what I needed, an injection of Dharma as the spring tries its best to burst into life, battling with the snow; a reminder of things I have already been taught (For anyone interested in listening to the talks on the four mind turning reflections, you can find the talks on Free Buddhist Audio). My attempts at routine haven’t quite manifested after moving to Bristol two months ago so to get immersed into Dharma and supported by Sangha felt like a really positive turning point in my year so far. Just being surrounded by my Sangha, in a different form was incredibly healing, actually seeing and experiencing a continuation, new life after a death, the turning of a wheel helped me to put aside some of the fears that I have had concerning about how Buddhafield will strive forward.

Getting out of the city and standing under the starry, starry skies of Devon also helped to put many things into perspective; that I can imagine pulling Orion’s sword from his belt to battle with delusion is quite magnificent. I have a capacity understand that human life is precious, brief and very rare. I have a body that, for its aches and pains, takes me places, allows me to dance. I have a mind that can imagine the most incredible things, takes in and filters information, forming opinions and allows me to reflect on the fact that I am here on a planet that supports my life, all life and that I have come into contact with a set of teachings that is helping me to see these incredible things more clearly. For some reason I still take this information for granted, I quite flippantly say ‘yeah, I know’ like the stroppy teenager I once was. My mind, or maybe all of me, still wants to cling to the negative, somehow, somewhere along the way the negative became the easier way to live.

But life is also impermanent and things do change, shift, transform and this sucks quite a lot of the time but occasionally and sometimes more than occasionally, the utter joy and relief of seeing something shift is amazing. So what shifted for over this week?

It sounds simple but the fact that I can change my mind, my perspective on how see things. Turning the negative approach into the positive approach. I try to look out for the changes and watch my emotional response to these changes. I find these initial responses fascinating and exploring how to move forward from that initial response is also fascinating!

When life starts to be seen as deeply connected as it is then all the actions that are taken must be taken with, at least, awareness and at most with awareness, kindness and compassion for yourself and for others. I have had to go back to myself, to understand my cravings, my fears and my inspirations and by knowing these things deeply, challenging the things that frighten me, questioning why I crave something, moving towards the things that inspire me I can strive forward and feed into a bigger picture of positive conditions.

Green Earth Awakening 2013: Update 3

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An update on the developing workshop programme for the Buddhafield Green Earth Awakening Camp 24—27 May 2013. Tickets still available on the event webpage.

Blacksmithing and Copper Bowl Making with the WindySmithy

“At the Windy Smithy we create a selection of individually hand crafted products in Devon, ranging from our own woodburning stoves, some handmade edge tools and decorative Ironwork to our unique Towavardo Travellers’ Wagons.

“I make log building tools, oak framing tools, bodgers tools, knives and bespoke tools including axes, drawknives, chisels, draw pins and a multitude of other tools and devices for the discerning house carpenter and logbuilder.

“I provide all that I can for a wide range of craftsmen, who have been having difficulty in finding the hand tool for the job, and I am happy to research a particular tool and to produce it, using either the traditional techniques, or modern methods, saving time and effort. I have travelled extensively in Scandinavia, learning relevant skills with a wide variety of toolsmiths, with many thanks to the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust for inspiration and support.


“Laminated blades, where the Tool Steel cutting edge is supported in a sandwich of softer mild steel, are often used in my tools, as the toughness of the surrounding material ideally complements the perfectly tempered edge steel. The layers are Forge Welded in the fire, creating a uniquely crafted tool.”

More on the Windy Smithy website.

Spoon Carving with Wayne’s Woods

Wayne’s workshops are popular at festivals across the country and include shave-horsing and pole lathing.

“I love the way that giving someone the chance to experience something that is closer to where I believe we need to be can have a massive influence on a person and help them to see life in a more sympathetic, realistic way. Skills such as shave-horsing, pole-lathing, weaving and carving help a person connect to something more primeval within them and also allow time for reflection within oneself. Spoon carving is amongst these empowering activities and needs to be promoted in as many ways as possible…”

Tinker’s Bubble

Talk on Living in Community and the History of Tinker’s Bubble, a low-impact community in Somerset with a strict principal to not use fossil fuels.

“Tinkers Bubble is a small woodland community which uses environmentally sound methods of working the land without fossil fuels.

“We have planning permission for self-built houses on the condition that we make a living from the land. We make our monetary incomes mainly through forestry, apple work and gardening. As a result we’re money poor but otherwise rich!

“We manage about 28 acres of douglas fir, larch, and mixed broadleaf woodland using horses, two person saws, and a wood-fired steam-powered sawmill.

“Our pastures, orchards, and gardens are organically certified, and no-dig methods are commonly used. We press apple juice for sale, grow most of our own vegetables, keep chickens and bees, and sell our produce at farmers markets. We make loads of jam, chutney, pickles, cider, and wine.

“We have solar powered 12v electricity, spring water on tap, and use compost toilets. We burn wood for cooking, heating, and for hot water in the bathhouse. We eat little meat (mostly game), and try to cater for all diets. Though some of us would consider ourselves to be spiritual, we have no shared spirituality. Most people wash their clothes by hand. Life is lived mostly outdoors, so it’s cold in the winter, but we live on the top of a steep hill, so there are plenty of chances to get warm! There’s loads of wildlife on site, particularly badgers, deer and ticks!”

More on www.diggersanddreamers.org.uk.

What is Ecodharma? An introduction to the Ecodharma centre by Alex Swain

The Eco-Dharma Centre is situated in a beautiful and wild part of the Catalan Pyrenees. Offering courses, events and retreats which support the realisation of our human potential and the development of an ecological consciousness honouring our mutual belonging within the web of life – drawing on the Buddhist Dharma and the emerging ecological paradigms of our time.

We offer courses and retreats that take place in a context of sustainable low-impact living, closely woven within the web of elemental nature. These meditation retreats, study seminars and training camps are intended to help people to empower themselves to make changes in themselves and the world consistent with a life-affirming vision.

We seek to develop practices which honour the inseparability of the transformation of the self and the world; to support the shift from a destructive industrial growth society to a life-affirming future; to contribute to the creation of a movement of renewal and resistance; to evolve spiritual practice where courageous compassion and a deepening realisation of our radical interconnectedness helps us to live in solidarity with life.

Introduction to Permaculture Design with Tim Potter

Tim has worked at the Earth Centre teaching Permaculture and sustainability and has a BSc in Countryside Management and Interpretive Design with an Emphasis on Sustainability.

Permaculture is a branch of ecological design, ecological engineering, and environmental design which develops sustainable architecture and self-maintained horticultural systems modelled from natural ecosystems.

The design principles which are the conceptual foundation of permaculture were derived from the science of systems ecology and study of pre-industrial examples of sustainable land use. Permaculture draws from several disciplines including organic farming, agroforestry, integrated farming, sustainable development, and applied ecology. Permaculture has been applied most commonly to the design of housing and landscaping, integrating techniques such as agroforestry, natural building, and rainwater harvesting within the context of permaculture design principles and theory.
Taken from the Wikipedia article.

Devapriya: A Scattering of Ashes

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On the afternoon of Sunday March 24 2013, the Buddhafield Family Friendly Village Retreat Heart Team, who were on a weekend retreat at Paddington Farm, Glastonbury, scattered a portion of Devapriya’s ashes.

About 20 people climbed to the top of Glastonbury Tor in the bitter cold, to cast a set of his ashes off to the four quarters as per Devapriya’s last wishes. Making their way down to Lokanbandhu’s field below the Tor, the party scattered a few more ashes at the foot of a tree that had lived on the balcony of Devapriya’s London flat, recently planted in the field as a permanent memorial.

Green Earth Awakening 2013: Update 2

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An update on the programme for this year’s Green Earth Awakening Camp 24—27 May 2013. We’ve got a full team for the Buddhafield Café, but we’re still looking for Site Crew and Decor Crew.

Solar Power

The future is bright the future is solar! Solar Workshop and Discussion with Solar Energy Alliance Ltd. Practical system set up. Discussion on how a system is designed and installed. Workshops for adults and children.

Based in Lowestoft Solar Energy Alliance are Suppliers and installers of solar PV in Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire regions.

We are like tenant farmers chopping down the fence around our house for fuel when we should be using Nature’s inexhaustible sources of energy — sun, wind and tide. … I’d put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don’t have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that.
Thomas A Edison, 1931 in conversation with Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone.

Spinning Workshop with Beetle Felt

Learn the ancient craft of spinning and make your own unique yarn using a drop spindle for use in knitting, crochet or weaving. With Dee Sayce; more information on the Beetle Felt website.

Join the Tuffeteer to Create an Eco-Friendly Tuffet!

With Joanna Vosper, create your own tuffet with The Travelling Tuffeteer. Eco-friendly and lightweight:

The “tuffet” — a wonderfully comfortable seat pad made entirely of woven wool. After in-depth research I discovered the secret of this wonderful experience of “bottom heaven”. It seems selfish to not share this comfort with friends and other like-minded people and so begins the creation of The Travelling Tuffeteer and the slogan “Bottom Heaven since 2011”. The tuffet is organic, water resistant due to the natural lanolin and is deliciously sheepy!!

Ethical Leather?

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Ethical Aspirations and Coping with Consumption

For many, veganism is an ethical decision to protect animals from a gross manipulation. Having been vegan myself, it is a minefield of ethics; to manoeuvre oneself around the array of animal products so imperceptible in many everyday items. Photographic films and papers use gelatine made from the hides and bones of cows and pigs. Most wines and beers use fish swim bladder derivatives to improve clarity and remove impurities. A red food colouring known as carmine is made from ground beetles. Stearic acid made from animal fat is used in baked goods, beverages, car tyres and fireworks. Animal fats are also found in plastic bags, wood glue, bio fuels, shampoos, fabric softener and tooth paste.

Leather is a strong, water resistant material in high demand for use in shoes, bags, coats, hats and gloves. The leather industry is worth £593 billion a year in the UK and most leather brought into the UK and Europe comes from India, China and countries where no laws protect animal welfare. According to PETA, People for Ethical Treatment of Animals:

…In addition to the cattle, sheep, and other animals who are killed for leather in China, an estimated 2 million cats and dogs are killed for their skins each year.

Confined to wire cages in which they can barely move, these animals are routinely skinned alive and hacked apart, piece by piece, until they bleed to death. Many products made from the skins of dogs and cats are bought unknowingly by consumers because the products are often intentionally mislabelled and do not accurately indicate their origins.”

In India cows are revered as holy and thus protected by law in all but two states which forces the leather industry to operate illegally. Bribery and corruption allow a harmful practice to go unregulated. Mrs Ghandi, Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment in 2000 claimed:

There is a huge amount of trafficking of cattle to both West Bengal and Kerala… I’ve seen 900 cows coming out of the wagon of a train, and 400 to 500 of them came out dead.

On the route to Kerala they don’t bother with trucks or trains: they tie them and beat them and take them on foot, 20,000 to 30,000 per day. [All Kerala’s slaughter houses are on the border.] Because they have walked and walked and walked the cattle have lost a lot of weight, so to increase the weight and the amount of money they will receive, the traffickers make them drink water laced with copper sulphate, which destroys their kidneys and makes it impossible for them to pass the water — so when they are weighed they have 15kg of water inside them and are in extreme agony.
How India’s Sacred Cows are Beaten, Abused and Poisoned to Make Leather for High Street Shops, Peter Popham, The Independent, 14 February 2000

So what are the alternatives? Pseudo–leather such as Naugahyde, Durabuck, NuSuede, and Hydrolyte have been created to satisfy the hide consumption but have not replaced the demand. Petro-chemical based materials will take 500 or more years to break down compared to the 25 to 40 years of leather.

Fish skins are now being offered as an ethical alternative to the leather industry. The skins of supposedly non endangered species, sourced sustainably, that would have been discarded as by-products from the food industry are being adapted into a reptilian style leather. The tanning of the fish skins are similar to the process used in the leather industry, minus the polluting effect of harmful chemicals used in hair removal and preservation such as aluminium, chromium sulphide and mercury.

This new leather has been adopted by the fashion industry and is bringing in the “eco” pound for its ethical credentials. The waste skins of salmon, trout, cod, wolf fish, Nile perch, pike-perch, tilapia and grass carp can be transformed into strong, lizard like clothing materials with a reduced environmental impact and the benefits of “recycling”.

This sounds like an ideal solution to the leather industry with no negative impacts, but it is important to consider that when a product becomes popular and industry backed, sooner or later an ethical intention will be pushed aside in favour of money. Fish skin leather is now made from a waste product, but its manufacture may encourage the farming of fish purely for their skins.

So how do we make a choice? We have to weigh up what is the least harmful now. Vegans may argue that any use of an animal product for our own benefit is causing ultimate harm to that creature. We need to curb our consumption of shoes, hats and bags. We need to reduce our waste of discarded materials that could be re used and re cycled. These are ethical aspirations we should work towards, but we need to focus on the here and now. Our consumption of leather is high and industry will continue to meet those demands without consideration of animal welfare. Pseudo-leather materials have been available for some time, but have never become a realistic competitor to animal based products. The use of fish skins have captured the fashion industry and could displace the abuse of farmed animals. While fish leather is making use of waste skins, the balance at present, tips in favour of this seemingly less damaging alternative. Should we put our efforts into cultivating an awareness of these alternatives to limit a destructive industry?

At Buddhafield’s Green Earth Awakening, a tanner and leather worker will be offering workshops on how to make and work with fish leather. The intention of this workshop is to promote a sense of self sufficiency necessary to curb our consumption and reliance on mass industry. For some, this may be limiting in reducing our impact on living beings and the use of leather in any form should be boycotted. For other’s this may serve as an intention to finding alternatives to the damaging industry that is feeding our high consumption here and now. For all of us, perhaps we can unite in recognising our aspirations towards a society whose consumption and desires do not take priority over the welfare of living beings.