PSC Facilitators & Tutors

Permaculture Design - Lead Tutor

Matt Dunwell

After owning & running Ragmans Lane Farm since 1990, Matt Dunwell has gifted the farm to the Ecological Land Co-operative, and is now starting a new chapter and return to teaching. Matt and Ragmans Lane Farm have has hosted numerous courses over the last eighteen years for teachers such as Bill Mollison, Mike Feingold, Chris Evans, Andy Langford and Jude and Michel Fanton from Australia, Starhawk and Penny Livingston- Stark. Jairo Restrepo and Juanfran lopez have helped introduce biofertilisers to Ragmans which are now used on the farm to build system health. He has farmed livestock (cattle, pigs, sheep and poultry), vegetables, mushroom production and apple juicing. He co-authored the first Local Food Directory in 1997. He has been a Trustee of the Tudor Trust for 25 years. He is currently exploring regenerative agriculture methods.

Matt Dunwell is a teacher and consultant specialising in soil health and fertility, Biofertilisers and Permaculture Design. After owning & running Ragmans Lane Farm since 1990, Matt has gifted the farm to the Ecological Land Co-operative, and is now starting a new chapter and return to teaching. Matt and Ragmans Lane Farm have has hosted numerous courses over the last eighteen years for teachers such as Bill Mollison, Mike Feingold, Chris Evans, Andy Langford and Jude and Michel Fanton from Australia, Starhawk and Penny Livingston- Stark. Jairo Restrepo and Juanfran lopez have helped introduce biofertilisers to Ragmans which are now used on the farm to build system health. He has farmed livestock (cattle, pigs, sheep and poultry), vegetables, mushroom production and apple juicing. He co-authored the first Local Food Directory in 1997. He was a Trustee of the Tudor Trust for over 25 years. He is currently exploring regenerative agriculture methods. (Permaculture Design / Soil / Forest Gardening / Regenerative Agriculture)

Regenerative Toolkit / Ecological Citizenship - Lead Tutor

Deborah Benham

For the last 25 years I've been exploring, through various pathways, how humanity can become ecological citizens - positively contributing to our places and ecosystems, living within planetary boundaries, and helping to create a thriving future for humanity and the wider living world. I started out as a marine mammal biologist and wildlife guide, then becoming a sustainability trainer, deep nature connection practitioner and working within the Transition towns movement to support community led climate resilience. Most recently I’ve been diving into the wonderful world of biomimicry - becoming a systems level Biomimicry educator, supporting people and groups to reconnect with, learn from and emulate nature's patterns and principles.

Deborah Benham For the last 25 years I've been exploring, through various pathways, how humanity can become ecological citizens - positively contributing to our places and ecosystems, living within planetary boundaries, and helping to create a thriving future for humanity and the wider living world. I started out as a marine mammal biologist and wildlife guide, then becoming a sustainability trainer, deep nature connection practitioner and working within the Transition towns movement to support community led climate resilience. Most recently I’ve been diving into the wonderful world of biomimicry - becoming a systems level Biomimicry educator, supporting people and groups to reconnect with, learn from and emulate nature's patterns and principles.

Hear Deborah talking on the Accidental Gods podcast. (Ecological Citizenship / Biomimicry)

Group Dynamics / Bristol Commoning - Lead tutor

Danny Balla

Danny is a creative facilitator dedicated to ecological justice, community empowerment and facilitating systemic change. He explores human relationships with the world and each other through a combination of activism, participatory arts projects and community building, and has supported many organisations as a professional facilitator and trainer. His background is in immersive theatre, storytelling and film, and he is passionate about inclusive, experiential tools for participatory democracy.

Based in Bristol, Danny is a dedicated Shifty and has been part of the Shift Facilitation Team for over 5 years. He is also a Director of Coexist, through which he is launching a project called The Bristol Commons - a community-building initiative bringing people from diverse groups into dialogue together through a cultural programme of events and community conversations around Rebuilding the Commons. He is also a founder of arts-activism collective CoResist, and a contributor on organisational change programmes such as Craigberoch’s Decelerator Lab and a Programme Lead and Trainer at the transformative youth organisation LIFEbeat.

Danny Balla is a creative facilitator dedicated to ecological justice, community empowerment and facilitating systemic change. He explores human relationships with the world and each other through a combination of activism, participatory arts projects and community building, and has supported many organisations as a professional facilitator and trainer. His background is in immersive theatre, storytelling and film, and he is passionate about inclusive, experiential tools for participatory democracy. Based in Bristol, Danny is a dedicated Shifty and has been part of the Shift Facilitation Team for over 5 years. He is also a Director of Coexist, through which he is launching a project called The Bristol Commons

Practical Sustainability Course Facilitator & Coordinator

Kizzie Fitzwilliams

Kizzie's background is largely in freelance gardening on a domestic scale, and also growing organically and biodynamically on a commercial scale, here in Bristol, in Herefordshire and in Brighton, where she lived as a student. In 2018 Kizzie became a 'Shifty 9-er' as a student on the Practical Sustainability Course. In 2020 she left Bristol and slowly moved north into the mountains of Snowdonia - gardening, foraging, printmaking, swimming up currents - but after a colossal bike adventure along the coasts of Southern Europe, early in 2022, she has returned to Bristol to set down roots and become co-facilitator of the Practical Sustainability Course - she rocks!

Tutors With Multiple Sessions

Mike Feingold

Mike Feingold has been teaching Permaculture to, and learning from, communities around the world including Nepal, India, Palestine, Kenya and beyond for over 20 years. He has also been maintaining Royate Hill Community Orchard and an inspiring permaculture allotment in Bristol for most of that time. He is a founder member of the Bristol Permaculture Group and organiser of the Glastonbury Festival Permaculture demonstration garden. He is passionate about finding new and inventive avenues to redistribute local food 'waste'. Mike is one of the UK ‘s leading activist in sustainable and experimental gardening. (Permaulture)

Dr Emilia Melville

Dr Emilia Melville has spent time working in several organisations in the community energy sector, including being a founder-member of Bristol Energy Co-operative in 2011, working for Carbon Co-op in Manchester, and Bristol Energy Network. Her work in community energy is underpinned by a systemic understanding of energy, from her engineering degree, and combines with her research on commons. Emilia is an experienced facilitator and researcher, whose interest is in democratising the changes we need to make to address the climate emergency. She is currently a director of Praxis Research and a Research Associate at the University of Bristol. (Commoning / Green Energy)

Humphrey Lloyd

Humphrey Lloyd is a grower and organiser at Three Hares Market Garden. Here they run an organic salad and veg operation founded on the principles of food sovereignty, located in the Chew Valley. Growing a broad range of produce and supplying their local community through a weekly Salad Drop scheme, as well through direct sales to restaurants and grocers. They are certified as organic with the Soil Association and we grow in a way that maximises both biodiversity and productivity. Tackling food poverty and working to improve the accessibility of high quality fresh produce is also central to their ethos. They are proud and active members of the small scale farmers’ union The Landworkers’ Alliance. Three Hares Market Garden is a tiny part of a global movement that is transforming our food system from the bottom up. (Organic Horticulture / Seed Saving / Local Food Systems)

Sarah-Poppy Jackson

Sarah-Poppy Jackson is a freelance facilitator and mentor across the UK and online, drawing on inspiration from ecoliteracy, regenerative economics, seventh-generation thinking, servant leadership, systems theory, ecopsychology, and love. Her diverse background includes an Economics degree, corporate experience in marketing, sales, and events, and managing fundraising in public and charity sectors. After the 2008 economic crash, Sarah embarked on a three-year journey through South America, exploring sustainable living and teaching. On her return, she worked in environmental education and completed a master’s degree in Regenerative Economics at Schumacher College/Plymouth University. A Schumacher Institute fellow, Sarah is co-founder and director of Catalista and the Strode Waterfall Land & Story Project. She stewards land using regenerative, permaculture, and agroforestry principles, recently certified by the Soil Association. Sarah is also the author of Reclaim Your Sht!*—a zine on our relationship with water and waste—and a mother of a three-year-old. She holds accreditation with the Natural Academy in Ecopsychology and Nature-based Practice and is a member of the Nature & Health Practitioners Network and the Climate Psychology Alliance. (Regenerative Toolkit : Nature connection practices)

Kabbo Hue Qua Tura

Kabbo Hue Qua Tura is a storyteller, cultural practitioner and community arts facilitator.
Born on the Cape Flats in Bonteheuwel, South Africa, he is of Indigenous Goringhaiqua Goringhaíçona, Barbadian, Cape Malay and Huguenot heritage.

His work is rooted in ancestral and lineage research and draws from years of initiation and cultural practice. Since moving to the UK in 2014, //Kabbo has collaborated widely across Bristol’s cultural and educational sectors. He co-founded the Afrikan Storytelling Village and The Altered Festival, exploring storytelling, sound and voice as tools for healing and cohesion. His practice centres on reviving culture, memory and connection through arts-based community projects that celebrate Bristol’s rich multicultural landscape.

Jenny Ford

Jenny Ford is a sustainable construction strategist working across many aspects of the built environment. She works with clients and stakeholders to raise awareness of and enable the transition to more low carbon, circular practice within new build, retrofit and reuse projects. She is motivated by material stories - past, present and future; the complexity of social, environmental and economic impacts; carbon literacy and supply chain/procurement practices. She is working toward bringing a circular construction material facility and building showpark to Bristol. She founded a not-for-profit members organisation called No Small Thing to showcase and share circular and regenerative activity in the region. (Retrofitting / Green Building)

Hannah Padgett

Hannah Padgett has over ten years experience involving communities in the design of the objects, environments and messages that fill their everyday lives. She has worked in areas such as street design, active travel, social health and public art, supporting key stakeholders and public champions, local authorities and institutions, businesses and individuals to come together to co-create outcomes that are informed by the people that use them. Hannah was a PSC student in 2018/19 and currently makes use of her shifty skills at the Ecological Land Cooperative as Community Development Manager, as Founding Director of Hay Regenerative Soils CIC and as an artisan cheese maker. (Community Engagement / Community Land Trusts)

Sagara Swier

Sagara Swier – Life has been an emerging living experiment of many chapters. His three acre Forest Garden, now 11 years old, is a synthesis of all that has gone before: studying then working in Horticulture in New Zealand, working as a professional Photographer, studying Psychosynthesis, becoming ordained and living for four and a half years on a Buddhist retreat in the mountains of Spain, working as a Sculptor and developing Land Art Projects with an unfolding curiosity and earthy inventiveness. An in-depth study of Forest Gardening led to absorbing many of the principles of Permaculture. All the way along Sagara has been developing the ‘Mandala Life Design’ as a means to help others uncover and live out their deep purpose. (Forest Gardening / Life Mandala Process)

Becs Griffiths

Becs Griffiths has been a Medical Herbalist since 2009. Initially practicing in a primary heatlhcare clinic in New Orleans offering integrated free healthcare. They then found Rhizome Community Herbal Clinic in Bristol in 2011 where they have seen and supported hundreds of people. They are in partnership with Annwen Jones, and together have been running the clinic and teaching herbal medicine since 2013. They have taught various community self care courses as well as teaching herbalists at their professtional bodies annual conferences and herbalist training courses. Together they founded Herbalists without Borders Bristol in 2016 and were part of the collective organising the Radical Herbal Gatherings since 2013. (Herbal Medicine)

Annwen Jones

Annwen Jones from Rhizome Clinic graduated from The University of East London in January 2012 with a BSc (Hons) first class degree in Herbal Medicine. She was also awarded the Arthur Barker Award from the National Institute of Medical Herbalists for the best graduate. Immediately after she finished her training, she gained valuable experience working in London as part of the Herbal Barge project alongside respected herbalist Melissa Ronaldson, taking herbal medicine to different parts of the city via the waterways, giving health advice to the public, making medicinal herbal products and harvesting herbs. Her own clinical practice began in the autumn of 2012 when she began working as a herbalist with Rhizome Community Herbal Clinic, and then in 2013 as a herbalist in the complementary health low cost clinic at Wellspring Healthy Living NHS Centre in Barton Hill. Since then she has gained a wide breadth of clinical experience helping hundreds of people passing through the Rhizome clinic. She continues her professional development, attending conferences and seminars all over the UK and Ireland. (Herbal Medicine)

Tim Foster

Tim Foster has been teaching organic gardening courses in and around Bristol for 25 years. He has extensive experience of horticulture, gardening, landscaping, nursery-work, garden centre-work, tree-work and market gardening as well as a degree in horticulture and a BEd. He also has a keen interest in growing trees, wine-making and drawing. He has recently written two books, organic vegetable growing (‘Good Earth Gardening') and organic fruit growing ('Fruit for Life') (Organic Horticulture)

A community-building initiative bringing people from diverse groups into dialogue together through a cultural programme of events and community conversations around Rebuilding the Commons. He is also a founder of arts-activism collective CoResist, and a contributor on organisational change programmes such as Craigberoch’s Decelerator Lab and a Programme Lead and Trainer at the transformative youth organisation LIFEbeat. (Group Dynamics / Commoning)

Miriam McDonald

Miriam McDonald is one of the co-founders of Holistic Restoration. A stark realisation of the disparate climatic, ecological and social crises faced by the world drove them to look for integrated solutions. As individuals, they dedicated their time to working and learning across conservation, agriculture, forestry, academia and community development. Together Mim and Rob have combined their knowledge and melded their experiences to form Holistic Restoration, a fully integrated framework through which to view our complex and myriad roles in the ecosystems that sustain us and from which we can forge a path towards regeneration. Since April 2022, they have been researching and demonstrating holistic restoration at a farm in the Derbyshire Dales. A place where Regenerative Production, Wilding and Nature Connection weave together for the benefit of people and ecosystem. (Soil & Ecology / Keystone Species)

Robyn Hambrook

Robyn Hambrook is a Bristol-based director, teacher and performer. With over 20 years experience she is a passionate practitioner of clowning, physical theatre, circus and street arts. She has a MA in Circus Directing, a Diploma of Physical Theatre Practice and trained with a long line of inspiring teachers including Holly Stoppit, Peta Lily, Giovanni Fusetti, Bim Mason, Jon Davison, Zuma Puma, Lucy Hopkins and John Wright.
Over the past five years she has been exploring the meeting point of clowning and a deep desire to address the injustices in the world. This specialism has developed through her Masters Research ‘Small Circus Acts of Resistance’, on the streets and in protests with the Bristol Rebel Clowns and in research residencies with The Trickster Laboratory. Robyn founded the Bristol Clown School. (Regenerative Toolkit : Clowning / Play).

Alice Gray

Alice Gray is a permaculture farmer, teacher and consultant who helps to manage a community vegetable farm (Tyddyn Teg) in Snowdonia, North Wales that serves over 200 families via a weekly veg scheme. She is a certified Permaculture Educator who both organises and teaches full PDC courses and enjoys co-operating with and supporting other teachers. In addition, she works as a permaculture consultant in the international development sector and has been part of projects in Palestine, Jordan, Egypt, Israel, Kashmir, South Sudan and Ireland. Alice gained much of her permaculture experience during 10 years living and working in the Middle East (primarily in Palestine) from 2006-2015, during which time she helped found and run an experimental permaculture farm as well as qualifying as a teacher and working as a consultant. She returned to the UK in 2015 to help with the establishment of Tyddyn Teg and has since enjoyed honing her skills as a grower and learning to function as part of a workers' co-operative - applying permaculture design to the visible and invisible components of a productive community farm. She lives in a caravan in a muddy field with her partner and 3 cats, alongside other Tyddyn Teg co-op members. (Permaculture : In action & Water).

Rachel Fountain

Workshops & events curator. Permaculture garden design. Horticultural hedgewitchery. Foraging enthusiast. Folklore story teller. missfountain@ymail.com

Carine van Gestel

Carine van Gestel is a willow artist and sculptural maker specialising in large-scale woven installations and living structures, guiding collaborative builds that blend technical skill with an intuitive sense of form and place.

Tutors With One Day Sessions

Steve England

Steve England is excited by all things 'Wild' from food to wildlife. He spends most of his time outdoors, learning, relaxing and teaching others. During his ten years training with the RHS and years of “in the field” he has gained masses of knowledge on plants, trees, fungi, flowers & animals. He runs 'Wild Food' events food those interested in everything from learning the basics of food foraging, expanding their knowledge of wild mushrooms, or just fancying a good day out in the woods to try some tasty wild foods. (Foraging / Ecology)

Maddy Longhurst

Maddy Longhurst is an experienced community coordinator, campaigner and facilitator with focus on holistic placemaking, food system resilience and the protection of soils for nature recovery, health, and increasing citywide self reliance both systemically and personally. She brings the right people together at the right time, building bridges across difference. Maddy is also passionate about engaging young people in change making given that they are the ones inheriting all the challenges we've laid out for them. She is currently a Project Manager / Coordinator the for the Urban Agriculture Consortium, Director at Tiny House Community Bristol, and Gleaning Training freelancer at Feedback - Feeding People, Backing the Planet. (Commoning / Housing)

Siân Kidd

Sian Kidd is a Bristol based artist and puppetry practitioner whose expertise ranges from puppet making and direction through to creative consultancy and arts education. Driven by a passion for sustainability and environmentalism, Siân is inspired by nature, often using natural materials and found objects within her work. She enjoys exploring the themes of mortality and wildness, finding the stories behind objects and celebrating the curious and playful in the everyday. She is also a founder of Bristol's Secret Soup Society; a social enterprise that fights food waste and feeds families. They make soup using food destined for landfill and redistribute surplus food and goods to organisations fighting food inequality. To date, they’ve served over 2000 portions of soup, saved about three tons of food from landfill and have a team of 10 volunteers who regularly come and cook, or rescue, food. (Food Waste / Community Engagement)

Jose Barco

Jose Barco has previously been a Community Organiser in Bristol in 2016, he is also a Art of Hosting practitioner, trainer, social entrepreneur and Columbian musician. Jose is the founder of Community CoLab. He is passionate about people power, social change and social justice, creating spaces for meaningful participation, collaboration and self organisation in communities and organisations in Colombia and the UK. (Group Dynamics : Power)

Jo Kamal

Jo Kamal is an activist and farmer who cares passionately about the future of food growing. They are involved in the project Pathways To Land aims to address intersectional barriers that racialised minorities face in securing farmland, especially those with less access to finance, to make thriving and remaining in the sector a genuine possibility for them. Their podcast touches on topics of colonialism, race and the perspectives of young people today. (Landworkers Rights / Place & Ownership)

Natasha Michin

Tasha uses case studies and shares lived experience of how we can organise ourselves into groups/co-ops to increase our power, resilience, and meeting our needs for secure housing, fair working conditions, buying commodities such as food etc.

Ben Moss

Ben Moss studied Permaculture on the Sustainable Land Use course at Ragmans Farm in 2002 taught by Patrick Whitefield. He co-founded Bristol Wood Recycling Project in 2004, where he still works, as Director and Co-operative Secretary. Ben lives with his family in a caravan in the woods on their smallholding in the Chew Valley where they operate a social enterprise - Strode Waterfall Land and Story Project - and the early stages of a forest garden and agroforestry production system. He's also co-founder of Chew Valley Plants Trees. (Woodland Creation / Circular Economies)

Beth Lindfield

Beth Lindfield has taught on the PSC for the last three years, where she has brought to life the craft of willow weaving and basketry for our novice student weavers. She is a considered and compassionate tutor, who understands the needs of people as well as she understands the unique qualities of working with willow. (Craftsperson / Weaver)

Florence Hamer

Florence Hamer is a full time traditional craftswoman and woodworker currently based in Bristol, where she; makes, sells and teaches endangered crafts; specialising in green woodworking and basketry. In 2023 she was awarded 1st place in the contemporary category of the ‘Basketry of the Year’ competition held by the Basketmakers Association. And also had a basket selected for the shortlist of the ‘Bespoke Product Design’ category in the 2023 ‘Wood Awards’. She is hugely passionate about endangered and traditional crafts; how they relate to our built environment and the guardianship of these skills. She has a degree in Renewable Energy engineering from the University of Exeter as well as a NVQ level 3 in Heritage Woodland Occupation. In 2020, she completed the ‘Building Arts Programme’ with the Princes Foundation and QEST (Queen Elizabeth Scholarship Trust). (Craftsperson / Weaver)

Ava Riby-Williams

Ava Riby-Williams is a queer, British Ghanaian/Indian visionary, living in London. She acts out life purpose as a Creative Facilitator, Artist and Wellbeing guide who celebrates diversity and finds divinity in all of life. She uses arts and healing based practices to guide groups into deeper contemplation of issues concerning identity, oppression and liberation- on personal and collective levels. (Group Dynamics : Power and Privilege)

Lewis McNell

Lewis McNeill shares his 14 years of urban community orchards experience, that has spanned working as the 'Fruit-full schools' project manager for London, for Learning through Landscapes, and London project manager for the Orchard Project. Lewis joined LTL in 2010 for the four year Fruit-full schools project, before also joining TOP in 2011. As well as supporting diverse communities to design, plant and care for their own orchards, he delivers training on all aspects of community orcharding, and is a tutor for TOP's accredited Certificate in Community Orcharding. A deep interest in ecologically sustainable food systems is the logical conclusion of Lewis’ lifelong fascination with nature and ten years as an environmental educator and activist. He can often be found with his head buried in books and papers about soil microbes and mulch, and visiting organic orchards in his spare time. He’s currently working on his Diploma in Applied Permaculture Design and is known for his passionate and engaging talks and workshops on all things fruit tree! A self-confessed chutney and cider-fiend he puts London’s fruit bounty to good use in the kitchen. (Orchards / Community Engagement)

Jackson Moulding

Jackson Moulding has worked in the field of community-led housing over the last 20 years. His background has focused on group self-build, self-finish, environmental sustainability, practical design, energy efficiency and renewable energy. Having been part of the development team for The Yard, where he built his own home, he has supported two self-finish projects, and has set up a pop-up build space where he is constructing modular timber frame homes SNUG Homes. Through Ecomotive, Jackson provides training in construction skills, along with consultancy and group support. He was a founding member of the National Custom and Self Build Association, and the Bristol CLT, and he remains a director of the Ashley Vale Action Group, which manages the Wildgoose Space, and owns Bridge Farm. (Green Building : Self Builds /Community Land Trusts)

Rubba

Affectionately known as Rubba, is an Afrikan/global dance extraordinaire, celebrated performer & teacher. Rubba picked up his nickname as a 16-year-old whilst living on the street of St Paul’s Bristol, where he discovered his innate desire to dance. He instinctively knew that even if he had nothing else going for him, at least he could dance his troubles away. His spiritual approach, fluid technique, supple movements, and graceful style of dancing has endeared him to audiences, fellow dancers & students all over the world. Without doubt he is versatile and one of a select few who can; perform, teach, deliver excellent workshops and implement meaningful projects. He only lives for one thing and that is to continue offering African holistic and traditional forms of expression towards. What he has learned from a life dedicated to this form of expression is that it is not just about dance; but a life enhancing holistic practice, that will definitely improve mental and physical wellbeing. Rubba’s passion and love for African Dance and drumming has permeated every aspect of his life and is clear to anyone who has the pleasure of being taught by him or working with him. Click here for more in depth bio. (Regenerative Toolkit : African Drumming)

Alan Kellas

Alan Kellas has worked as a doctor, in self help, complementary and hospital NHS settings, mainly as a community psychiatrist for adults and children with complex needs. He did Shift's Practical Sustainability Course 2013-2014, and has been involved in West of England partnerships between health care and nature organisations, Green social prescribing, medical education about Blue health, and has a small mentoring practice for people and their projects. (Blue Social Prescribing / Place & Ownership)

Duncan Jackson

Duncan Jackson is a permaculture designer completing a permaculture design consulting course at the Regenerative design institute, California in 2010. He formed The Food Foresters in 2012, a permaculture design and implementation company, which have been involved in designing and implementing growing systems for communities and schools as well as private clientele. The Food Foresters have also run workshops in permaculture, foraging, basket making and forest bathing. (Permaculture : Permablitz Practicals)

Kasia Poltorek

Kasia helped to form The Food Foresters in 2012, a Permaculture design and implementation company, which have been involved in designing and implementing growing systems for communities and schools as well as private clientele. The Food Foresters have also run workshops in Permaculture, foraging, basket making and forest bathing. (Permaculture : Permablitz Practicals)

Molly King

Molly is a Shifty 14-er (last year's cohort) She is also a trauma-informed facilitator working with singing, choral harmony and breathwork to support wellbeing through voice and body. With a background in jazz and session singing alongside training in group voice therapy and breathwork, she brings together musical direction and holistic practice. Her session offers a playful, collective exploration of how nervous-system regulation can sit alongside creativity, using simple group singing and breathing practices to build connection and shared rhythm.

Rich Wright


Rich is a conservation mycologist at Plantlife, with a background in researching fungal ecology, heart-rot communities, and rare species translocation. They have over 20 years experience of field and practical mycology, holding positions at Royal Botanic Gardens Kew and Cardiff University, and have keenly engaged in fungal education both in life-long-learning and university settings. They also produce creative works that reimagine ecological knowledge, blending analysis with emotional depth to explore conservation, non-human connection, and the hidden magic of nature.

Camille Straatman


Camille is a stained glass artist and metal worker, doing a PhD about crafts and human-environment relations. Her artwork often explores the boundaries between the natural world and our dream worlds. The richness that can be experienced in both these worlds, the wealth of colours, shapes and life forms, inform her window designs. By looking through them, they invite you to step into a new space, a new landscape, both familiar and never seen before. Nature’s shapes and the wealth of non-human life around us also form the inspiration for her metal work and other crafts practices.

Alice Pepperell


Alice specialises in cross-sector collaboration to drive meaningful change. As Manager of the Bristol Good Food 2030 Partnership, she unites stakeholders to co-create action plans and deliver impactful projects for a more sustainable and equitable food system. She has worked with organisations including the Bristol Climate and Nature Partnership, supporting strategic alignment and collective action.

Meg Avon Trump

Meg Avon Trump is not only a former Shifty, but also a Celebrant, poet, activist, performance artist, environmental romantic, and the woman who famously married the River Avon, one of the most polluted rivers in the UK. Since the wedding she has published her first collection of poetry My Avon and toured the UK, speaking publicly and passionately on behalf of her beloved. Meg’s ambition is to help find a way that this river, the Bristol Urban Avon, can help people fall in love for thousands of years to come. Through poetry, through performance, through ceremony and through conversation - always with a focus on joy and union.

Peni Ediker

Peni Ediker has a successful market garden business and orchard business in Carmarthenshire. She has transformed a 5 acre field into a rich bio diverse abundant haven. Method: Her success lies in her relationship with the microbiology in the soil. Peni grows abundant crops using regenerate farming techniques, making inoculated composts and bio fertilisers and other garden amendments. Peni has taught and inspired many people over the years with her passion and enthusiasm for natural farming techniques and her love of the land. Over the years, Peni has collaborated with CARE,  facilitating brilliant composting workshops on her small-holding. 

Sarah Mclellan


Sarah’s contribution weaves professional bodywork knowledge into this wider curriculum by offering grounded, experiential ways to explore embodiment, regulation, and care. Her polyvagal-informed approach aligns closely with PSC’s emphasis on systems thinking, self-responsibility, and people care; supporting you to integrate inner ecology with outer action, and to cultivate resilience that is felt, lived, and sustainable over time.

Alex Ruer


Alex’s work is rooted in the permaculture ethics of Earth Care, People Care and Fair Share. She holds a Level 3 Orchard Management qualification and is currently working towards a Level 4 Diploma in Arboriculture. In her work she collaborates with individuals and community groups to create habitats in which both trees and people thrive. Her particular interest is in forest gardens and perennial systems: creating and maintaining sustainable, healthy and biodiverse habitats that are productive, low-maintenance and suitable for the space. And empowering people to do this for themselves!

Emily Malki

Co-facilitates The Work that Reconnects alongside Sarah - Poppy

Shannon Smith

Shannon Smith is a fruit growing expert and experienced community orchard educator. She is a long-standing member of Horfield Organic Community Orchard, where she leads learning sessions and courses. (Orchards / Community Engagement)

Ped Asgarian

Ped Asgarian originally studied environmental sciences at University, but spent the next decade mixing travelling with the operational and commercial management of small to medium sized business in the food retail sector. Having spent seven years as managing director of The Community Farm – a CSA and social enterprise working to revolutionise and innovate the food system for the betterment of people and the planet – Ped was thrilled to accept the position of Director of Feeding Bristol. He is very excited about the impact this charity can have in solving the many issues of our local food system. Ped is also a founding member and sits on the board of Bristol Food Producers, an organisation aiming to upscale local food production and distribution. (Access to Land / Place & Ownership)

Chris Johnstone

Chris Johnstone is co-author, with Joanna Macy, of Active Hope – how to face the mess we’re in with unexpected resilience and creative power, a book now published in eighteen languages. He is also one of the UK’s leading resilience trainers, with four decades’ of experience teaching in this field. After a first degree combining medicine and psychology, he trained as a medical doctor and worked for many years in the mental health field. He has pioneered the role of resilience training in mental health promotion, coaching practice, activism and online education. More recently he’s been developing the concept and practice of ‘thrutopian wellbeing’. His online courses reach thousands of people, with participants in over seventy five countries. For info see https://collegeofwellbeing.com and https://activehope.training (Regenerative Toolkit : Active Hope)

Leanne Anyinsah

In the midst of the Covid pandemic Leanne Anyinsah was the mental health lead at a Fire Service and a part time therapist. To promote her own wellbeing and to stay connected with others and the outdoors, she met for family walks every Saturday – rain or shine! She also noticed how clients also benefitted from connecting with nature, and by working together with others and their unique set of skills and adding a spin to the average walk, they gave up their spare time volunteering to provide free walks to the Bristol community. The demand grew very fast, and they soon set up a non-profit organisation Soul Trail Wellbeing CIC. Providing free nature walks and a listening ear meant it was accessible to all, regardless of background or income. Soul Trail is now part of Bristol Green Social Prescribing, delivering varied projects to diverse communities. (Green Social Prescribing / Place & Ownership)

Heloise Balme

Heloise Balme has been involved in sustainable food since 2018, and worked for The Community Farm in Somerset before joining Bristol Food Network, where she is a director, as well as General Manager, running the organisation day-to-day. ​(Food Networks / Food Policies)

Field Trips

Three Pools Farm

Amy Cooper

Three Pools Farm is a farm and event space founded in 2017. It is an attempt to scale up permaculture practices used in farming beyond what is currently done in the UK. It looks to research and demonstrate regenerative farming techniques, whilst producing nutritious, flavourful food and drink and hosting high quality events that bring people into the landscape. The 141 acre farm is made up of a mixture of pasture, orchards, woodlands and a newly planted vineyard. Located in the foothills of the Black Mountains the farm provides a picturesque, secluded location for retreats and events.

BioAqua

Antonio Paladino

Antonio Paladino; farmer and educator of aquaponics, committed to mindful eating practices and the creation of positive change for people and environment. They farm Rainbow Trout and horticultural produce in the most simple and ethical way at their Bioaqua Farm. (Aquaponics)

Ragmans Lane Farm


Ragmans Lane Farm was owned and managed by the inspirational Matt Dunwell for over 33 years, who did incredible work building the profile of Ragmans into a farm known for teaching, experimenting and providing a platform for people to get access to land. Matt has decided to step back, and has gifted the farm to the Ecological Land Cooperative to take it into its next chapter. the land based businesses at Ragmans Lane into the cooperative as farm steward members. Steve Pickup runs the Willow Bank who produce living willow for structures, hedges and environmental restoration. Kim Fletcher runs the Ragmans Lane Market Garden, who grows quality organic fruit, vegetables and flowers for sale to local restaurants, shops, florists and veg box customers

Ambition Lawrence Weston

Mark Pepper


Lawrence Weston is a post-war housing estate on the north west outskirts of Bristol. Ambition Lawrence Weston was established in 2012 by a group of residents who wanted to make the area a better place to live, after a decline in local services. Ambition facilitates the ‘Lawrence Weston Community Network’ – a network that brings together all of the organisations (public and voluntary) in Lawrence Weston to encourage information sharing and joint projects and initiatives

Fivepenny Farm

Jyoti Fernandes and Ele Saltmarsh

Jyoti Fernandes is an agroecological smallholder farmer with a micro-diary at Fivepenny Farm based in Dorset. The farm is part of a local smallholders’ ‘Peasant Evolution Producers’ Co-Operative’ that shares processing facilities and markets the products of the members’ smallholdings collectively. She coordinates the Policy, Lobbying and Campaigning work of the Landworkers Alliance and is a co-founder. She is also a spokesperson for the global small-scale farmers coalition La Via Campesina, which represents over 200m people in more than 180 countries.

Ele Saltmarsh is the youngest member of the coordination group of Food Sovereignty UK, as well as the international campaign’s manager and heading up the youth group of the newly formed English branch of La Via Campesina. (Landworkers Rights / Place & Ownership)(International Landworkers rights and movements)

Monica Barlow

Monica Barlow is the policy advisor at Bees for Development, where they teach best practices in beekeeping to create sustainable and resilient livelihoods for vulnerable communities. They campaign for the protection and restoration of wildflower meadows and pollinator habitat in the UK, as well as supporting beekeepers who make the right choices and promoting their products. They also run inspiring courses and events. (Beekeeping)

Three Hares Farm

Humphrey Lloyd


Three Hares Market Garden is an organic salad and veg operation founded on the principles of food sovereignty and located in the Chew Valley. We grow a broad range of produce and supply it our local community through veg boxes and a weekly Salad Drop scheme, as well doing direct sales to restaurants and grocers. We are certified as organic with the Soil Association and we grow in a way that  maximises both biodiversity and productivity. Tackling food poverty and working to improve the accessibility of high quality fresh produce is also central to our ethos. We are proud and active members of the small scale farmers’ union The Landworkers’ Alliance. Three Hares Market Garden is a tiny part of a global movement that is transforming our food system from the bottom up.

The Community Pottery



The Community Pottery CIC was born from a passion for bringing people together through the craft of pottery. Founded by artists; Raphaela and Dan, we set out to create a space where anyone in Bristol, regardless of background or experience, could come to explore their creativity and learn the art of pottery. Located in St. Anne’s House, Bristol, our studio offers a range of pottery classes, wheel throwing sessions, and clay sculpting workshops for beginners and experienced artists alike. At The Community Pottery CIC, our mission is simple: to make pottery accessible to all, while fostering a sense of community and connection through creativity.

Tinkers Bubble

Tinkers Bubble, is an off-grid land-based community in South Somerset, where they work the land without using fossil fuels. The 40acre site includes coniferous and mixed broadleaf woodland with coppice understorey, grazed orchards, and vegetable beds. Woodland management involves felling trees using hand tools, coppicing, extracting timber by horse, and running a steam-powered sawmill. Land activities are managed communally, and the residents live in self-built houses in the woods. Alex is also a curator of the UK Communities Conference; with a particular interest in how we can re-imagine and experience-otherwise what it means to be human in relation to land, ourselves, and each other. (Woodland Management / Community Living)

Ourganics

Pat Bowcock

Pat Bowcock from Ourganics left her 9-5 lifestyle to live in tune with the land, creating her own five acre permaculture smallholding, that is her home, her work and her life. (Permaculture Homestead)

Voltaire’s Wood

Clair Cartwright


Voltaire's Wood is a classic English woodland in the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, just outside of Stroud in Gloucestershire. With over a hundred acres of semi-ancient natural woodland - beech, ash and oak, wild cherry and hazel - to explore, and food to forage - fungi, wild garlic and more - each season has its own surprise. The woods were in a state of neglect when they took it on in 2015. They are now working to restore old tracks, thinning out overgrown areas to encourage biodiversity and protecting natural wilderness. They aim to create a new culture for the woods of the 21st century, one that involves people being closely connected to the trees and soil, getting their boots dirty by doing, learning, observing and unwinding.

East Devon Forest Garden

Sagara Vajra

Three days spent in an established forest garden: having tours, foraging, unwinding, swimming, and participating in an intuitive process, designed to reveal your personal pathway

Swier – Life has been an emerging living experiment of many chapters. His three acre Forest Garden, now 16 years old, is a synthesis of all that has gone before: studying then working in Horticulture in New Zealand, working as a professional Photographer, studying Psychosynthesis, becoming ordained and living for four and a half years on a Buddhist retreat in the mountains of Spain, working as a Sculptor and developing Land Art Projects with an unfolding curiosity and earthy inventiveness. An in-depth study of Forest Gardening led to absorbing many of the principles of Permaculture. All the way along Sagara has been developing the ‘Mandala Life Design’ as a means to help others uncover and live out their deep purpose. (Forest Gardening / Life Mandala Process)


Roundhouse Team (Green Building / Woodworking / Cob buidling)

The ShelterCraft team met in 2017 while running roundhouse builds on the Practical Sustainability Course, and have been building together ever since. They enjoyed our annual Shift builds so much they decided to run more and launched ShelterCraft in March 2022.

They are a team of experienced builders, teachers, organisers and facilitators with decades of practical experience in the field between them. They are passionate about making the learning experience during their builds fulfilling and inspiring. 

Jo Forsyth

Jo Forsyth Originally training and working as a potter for ten years, Jo has spent much of her life with muddy hands! Jo studied and later taught courses with the Cob Cottage Company in Oregon USA and has developed her skills as a builder in conventional and timber and cob building settings. She designs, builds and teaches around the UK, Australia and the USA. As well as creating new buildings, She also works on the conservation and the restoration of historic buildings and is a slate roofer and cob, earth and lime plaster specialist.

Bryher Bloor

Bryher Bloor Alongside ShelterCraft Bryher works for the Landworkers Alliance, providing supporting farmers to move towards regenerative agricultural practices. In her previous work Bryher was a Campaign Manager for the Green Party – working to elect Green leaders, influence policy and get issues of sustainability and resilience into the public dialogue.

Charles Soares

Charles Soares After completing his first roundhouse on the Practical Sustainability Course in 2016, he went on to pursue his passion for timber framing, natural building and carpentry with a focus on sustainably sourced local timber. Charles joined the roundhouse build team in 2017, and went on to be a founding member of Sheltercraft.

Simon Crook

Simon Crook has a life long passion for making things out of wood. Since being a student on the Shift Practical Sustainability Course in 2011, he has married his carpentry skills and low impact ethos to deliver numerous natural building projects. He has developed some skills to simply relay scribing techniques required to accurately join round timbers, loving the challenge of demystifying the complicated.

Special Mentions

People who we have had the great pleasure of working with in the past

Our roundhouse legacy begins with Tony Wrench, who lives in West Wales in an extremely rural setting in a roundhouse that he designed using permaculture principles and built with his partner Faith. They had difficulty getting planning permission, but now it has been accepted as an official Low Impact Development. He runs courses around Europe teaching people to build roundhouses. Find out more here.