About
The CottageFarming.org website was created in response to my growing interest in sustainability in general and also in developing a local sustainable community. For me, this site is a way to capture ideas that may be of general interest to the online community as well as helping to orchestrate the efforts of my local community as they relate to eco-friendly, sustainable living.
What’s in a name? I selected the name “Cottage Farming” for this initiative for two reasons. The first is that I believe it evokes the concept of small, local, cottage industries (as opposed to large, global, megacorps), and the second is that I happen to live on Cottage Street. My hope is that by sharing what my family is doing to live a more sustainable lifestyle, we’re able to encourage our neighbors toward similar action, and perhaps share our success with the broader community of cottages around the globe.
Farming or gardening? It’s probably a relatively silly distinction at the size I’m talking about, but I see the act of farming as distinct from gardening. After all, we’re not talking about large-scale farms, just the small backyard variety with some vegetables, herbs, and whatnot. The difference (to me, at least) is that gardening is more of a pastime, while farming leans more toward a necessity. It could all be a semantic debate, but there ya’ have it.
How ’bout some specifics? I’m planning to let this site grow organically (no pun intended), so right now I’m not entirely sure what’ll eventually make it onto these pages. To start, I’m trying to focus on a small, actionable set of ideas that can be implemented in the real world. If you’re anything like me, there’s precious little time left in the day to manage an ecologically-friendly, sustainable life. Let’s not kid ourselves; sustainable living does take more work than the default. To that end, my goal is to clearly articulate what we’re doing and link to the resources found to be the most useful. While I’m not going to claim this is the perfect solution, at least you’ll get a perspective that’s based on experience (as flawed as it’ll be at times).
Who are you? First of all, I have no formal training or experience in anything remotely resembling sustainable living. I was a special effects designer, digital video producer, and technology entrepreneur. Up until recently, I was an Executive Producer and the Chief Innovator for the New England Patriots. While there, I founded a project for the Krafts that was spun out in January of 2007 as matchmine, a digital media discovery platform. If you’re still curious, you can read more about me on my MediaSlate.org bio page.
Parting thoughts: Live within your means, the means of the planet, and have fun doing it.
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