Calafou – the Ecoindustrial Postcapitalist Colony – is a settlement of around three dozen people in the Catalonian countryside. Concrete pylons standing 20 meters high hold a highway passing above the wild forest valley, where hall after dilapidated hall of industrial ruins stretch along the banks of a contaminated stream nurturing a twisted yet lively ecosystem. Echoes of unseen, passing cars blend into the organic static of wildlife, punctuated by beats booming from the hacklab speakers.
Dubbed The Hacker Monastery by some, this 3 years old effort aims to create a node in a self-sustaining network of cooperatives called Cooperativa Integral Catalana, developed at the site of a 13th century factory which was itself an industrial experiment, and builds on the local traditions of self-organisation and autonomy.
Not to be confused with ecovillages, Calafou has a strong technological focus, ranging from software and hardware development through permaculture to crafts based on recycling and local materials. While we are concentrating on creating and strenghtening local infrastructures, Calafou is not a self-enclosed entity but a constructive and sometimes combative participant in an extensive array of compatible projects, a mutated plague infecting even the mainstream society which is already ridden with opressive institutions.
Projects/infrastructures/initiatives include:
- hacklab (Lorea social network, Phone Liberation Front, libbitcoin cryptocurrency toolbox, etc.)
- hardware lab (transfeminist performances, ecomotors)
- biolab (under construction, slime moulds, forest microbes)
- wood and metal workshop (building materials, furniture, educational tools)
- metal foundry
- recovering and reinvigorating practices and knowledge on herbs, poultry, natural fibers, clay as building material, etc.