
The Threshold Centre at Cole Street Farm is a unique, pioneering cohousing community and sustainable education centre, which aims to demonstrate a way of life which is more green, more affordable, and more neighbourly.
Having operated on a pilot basis since late 2004, the Threshold Centre won planning permission and grant funding in 2008 to create a cohousing scheme at Cole Street Farm. It consists of fourteen dwellings, seven of which are affordable rent and shared ownership with a local housing association - a first in the short history of cohousing in this country. There is also a common house with shared facilities and guest rooms, green energy systems and a community market garden.
The Threshold Centre shows how to achieve major cuts in the three main aspects of domestic carbon emissions: home energy, food and travel.
For more information, see:
The Threshold Centre, Cole Street Farm, Cole Street Lane, Gillingham, Dorset, SP8 5JQ
www.thresholdcentre.org.uk

Unless otherwise stated, the cost of weekend courses (from 7pm Friday to Sunday pm) is £140 including lunch, tea/coffee; evening meals. Accommodation at the Threshold Centre/local B&B is £25/35 per night. A non-returnable deposit of £20 is requested to book a place on a course and £20 deposit for B&B. Concessions may be available, so please apply in writing.
For details and bookings for courses, please contact us on 01747 821929 or email: i...@thresholdcentre.org.uk
Building Plans
As you will know by now, we were delighted to get our planning permission (finally!) at the end of our fourth year. So a big thank you to everyone who has supported us during this time, practically, emotionally and spiritually.
The Big Build
The builders got off to an amazingly good start, with fine weather for the first few months. Part of the brief was to re-use as much original material as possible in the renovation and it is lovely to see tiles – complete with lichen - back on the roofs. Also the new cladding on both buildings is been locally sourced larch, so no air miles there.
The new septic tank biodisc installation was extraordinary to watch, with a huge digger (like something out of Thunderbirds) to get through the solid clay ground and create a huge hole for the tank. Now it is in place, with only its green lid above ground, it is difficult to recall how enormous it seemed.
Our Big Build!
We have lift-off! The remaining planning conditions have finally been discharged and builders are now on site. It’s so exciting, after all this time, to finally see (and hear) it beginning to happen before our very eyes. We are still on target for completion in January 2010.
The Threshold Centre in Dorset has recently received confirmation of grant funding from the Homes and Communities Agency enabling it to proceed with the first fully mixed-tenure cohousing scheme in the UK.
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