Chris and I would like to introduce Mark Fleischhaker who will be renting The Darfield Earthship for the next year. Mark is a BC-licenced structural engineer who designs earthships, tiny homes, laneway houses, greenhouses and alternative buildings that fall outside of Part 9 of the building code. He’s been involved in some really interesting projects over the years. You can learn about many of them here.

Chris and I moved to Toronto at the beginning of January to pursue some work opportunities with old friends and colleagues. All the kids have moved out now – wee Helen finished Grade 12 at Christmas – and we suddenly realized that we wanted to pursue work and community opportunities that weren’t possible in Darfield. We haven’t felt that we were gaining the most out of living in the earthship and in Darfield in recent years, and felt that change would be a good thing. Toronto is not new to us. We lived here for most of a decade in the 90s. We’re excited to be back and to be experiencing renewed friendships, different politics and wondrously beautiful landscapes in the province outside of the city. This may not be a permanent move, but it is likely to be long-term.

We recognized that it would take a special person to come and care for the earthship, and a special person who would appreciate all that it offers and all that it can give back. We’ve known Mark for a few years and have talked to him at several earthship build sites. He and Chris talk the same engineering language and share similar passions for a different way of building. In all my earthship networking and in social media discussions, Mark seems to be connected to the very same people we are connected to, proving that good people really do gather in the same spaces, both literally and figuratively!

We couldn’t ask for a better co-earthship-caretaker!

Mark plans on exploring lots of different activities while here in Darfield, including permaculture. We hope he takes his plans and experiments and runs with them and we hope that all of you get to take part in them too! He will soon have administrative rights to the website and our FB page and will let everyone know what he hopes to do.

Thanks for all the support over the years! Here’s to a new chapter for The Darfield Earthship!