Happy New Year everyone!
Welcome to 2025 at ECOSS. We are starting the year feeling very positive about ECOSS trajectory! We have almost finalised our process with Yarra Ranges Council and will connect to the Sewer by March. This is a groundbreaking achievement for us and enables us to plan with security in mind.
We are going to significantly grow the Native Nursery this year, which means we can all be proud to be part of revegetation within the community, assisting the Native flora and fauna that have lost so much due to logging and fires. Currently the Native Nursery is open with an honesty system from Tuesday to Saturday, but if you would like to place an order for tubestock please email: info@ecoss.org.au
We are gaining more and more interesting projects onsite including the addition of Woad in Pollination Place, more BioChar trials, more interesting wine being made by the Community Viticulture Group.
We are loving the beauty and abundance that all site users bring including Silvertine, Tonantzin Chocolate, The Pottery, The Dreaming Space, YV Bee Group, Bushwood Creations, Silvertop Joinery, herbal apocathery and more.
We are growing UpCycles and now have volunteers from our Crops for Community program assisting in this space which is fantastic. If you would like to volunteer or purchase an ethically upcycled bike please contact Damian on upcycles@ecoss.org.au
The Studios will be available for rent this year, adding opportunities for more interesting collaborations. We are calling in interested people to jump on the waiting list and to help volunteer building them. Please contact Chelsea on info@ecoss.org.au
We are increasing our Permaculture educational opportunities through the amazing work of the Volunteers in the Community Garden, The Food Forest, and through Ecotopia festival. We are seeking more volunteers in the Food Forest and at Events. If you can help volunteer at ECOSS please contact Mel on allabilities@ecoss.org.au
We are promoting the ECOSS Valley Market and ECOSS Organic Market Stall- trying to grow it significantly, we are inviting new stallholders, and are looking for someone who sells bread in particular to join the market. Please support our local producers and come along on Fridays 3.30-6pm starting this Friday 17th January. For a stall or any information contact Leanne on events@ecoss.org.au
This year we are hoping to grow our Corporate Volunteer and Wellbeing Program as well as increasing school bookings through our Practical Earth Education Program.
Our program is expanding all the time so please book in soon for school programs or for your Corporate Volunteerism through Kylie on eartheducation@ecoss.org.au
We have our schedule for our Major festivals almost complete which includes: Ecotopia Earth Festival, Valley Youth Fest, Rhythms of the World and Twilight Market. Unfortunately we don’t have funding for Ngulu Festival at this stage.
We have hit the ground running, preparing for Ecotopia 2025 on March 29th 12-6pm. We would love you to all be involved, whether you open your doors for tours, offer to volunteer or bring friends along. Please email events@ecoss.org.au
Thankyou for the Artisan Agriculture Twilight Market 2024
The Twilight Market was held on December 20th 2024, and sent the year out with a healthy bang.
Thanks to generous sponsorship from Agriculture Victoria, we were able to highlight 5 local Artisan Producers, and have 2 x 5 Star Chefs cook up a storm of delicious tastings for the whole festival from this produce. They focussed on utilising parts of the food that would be traditionally wasted. This was an amazing element to bring to the festival that we hope we can do again one day. Our Chefs Michael and Joshe worked hard for 3 days straight to ensure they delivered the community amazing food. The producers we were able to highlight included:
Peace Farm’s Fruit
Silvertine BioDynamic Farm Vegetables
Yarra Valley Bee Group Honey
Stone and Crow Cheese
Heidi’s Pastured Poultry free range Chicken.
The event also hosted the wonderful Costa Georgiadis and Brennas Book Launch. This began with Costa the Garden Gnome creating the Gallery of Ephemeral Art with the children at the festival with ‘Art Critic’ Brenna assessing the childrens artwork alongside Bidjara Artist Nikki Browne offering an Indigenous perspective on the artwork.
The event had so much entertainment including the wonderful Jigsaw Jumps, The Dreaming Space Permaculture Puppet Show, Clay Play, Face painting, ECOSS Tour, a huge Market with delicious food and locally made ethical produce.
The Stage performances were stellar, including local and far performances that had everyone dancing together.
We are very grateful to 4 Pillars Gin for sponsoring the Bar, enabling us to do some fundraising at this Free event.
The day was opened with a wonderful Welcome to Country by our very own Aunty Kim Wandin.
A HUGE thanks from us to everyone who Volunteered on the day- it takes a LOT of energy from many many people to be able to safely run events. We couldn’t do it without you.
We are so proud that this was a Waste Free Event thanks to the dedication and commitment of the vendors and the Washerupperers who washed all the dishes of the ENTIRE event!
Images of the event will be posted to ECOSS Facebook Page:
https://www.facebook.com/yarravalleyecoss
Regular Activities at ECOSS
Every Monday – West African Drumming contact: kofikunkpe@iinet.net.au
Every Tuesday- Crops for Community contact: allabilities@ecoss.org.au
Every Tuesday- The Dreaming Space Dance Classes contact: thedreamingspace@gmail.com
Every Tuesday- Native Nursery
Every Wednesday- Food Forest Working Bee contact: jarh.butler@gmail.com
Every Wednesday- Studio and Volunteers working bee contact: tomneil1966@gmail.com
Every Thursday- Working with Wood contact: tomneil1966@gmail.com
Every Friday- ECOSS Valley Market contact: ecotopiastalls@ecoss.org.au
Every Saturday- UpCycles at ECOSS contact: upcycles@ecoss.org.au
Second Friday of the Month- Poetry in the Dome contact: yarravalleyspokenword@gmail.com and thedreamingspace@gmail.com
Second Sunday of the Month- Herbal Apocothery contact: brigidweaver@mail.com
Fourth Sunday of the Month- Yarra Valley Bee Group contact: lyn3777@gmail.com
All Week- The Pottery at ECOSS contact: yvcpotterystudio@gmail.com
Co-working- contact ecoss_coworking@outlook.com
The ECOSS Valley Market is open EVERY Friday.
Here you’ll be able to purchase the finest quality BioDynamic Vegetables from Silvertine Biodynamic Farm- located at ECOSS, great wine by Broken Back Wines, delicious Tacos and hot Cacao at Tonantzin Chocolate, and many other goodies at the ECOSS Organic Market Shop. We often have other stalls and invite ethically aligned new stallholders to join us. Please email Leanne on ecotopiastalls@ecoss.org.au
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