Hemp Building Experience

Hemp Building Experience 2026

A hands-on workshop, learning to make & work with hempcrete to build a Solviva Greenhouse, which can grow food year round in places like Maine!

Join us at Diggers Co-op in Acton, ME to learn about building with hemp - including sourcing the materials, mixing the recipe, & installing it to form a livable structure.

We’ll be co-creating the structure for a Solviva Greenhouse, which will enable Diggers to grow food year round without the use of fossil fuels!

SLIDING SCALE PRICING:

Abundance - $700

Ideal for those who can comfortably afford this ticket and typically have enough to spend on vacations. This amount not only covers the cost of the workshop but also helps Permatours continue hosting additional educational events.

Sustaining - $550

Suitable for those who can generally cover their basic needs without financial strain. This fee covers all workshop costs.

Accessible - $400

Designed for those who may struggle to meet their basic needs, making participation possible. This contribution covers the cost of food and workshop materials.

**Worktrade & Scholarships also available. See more info below.

ABOUT THE PRODUCERS:

Permatours is a non profit focused on increasing food and housing security by creating joyful learn-by-doing experiences that teach people how to grow food and build structures regeneratively. Additionally, through hosting events at community centers throughout the U.S., we’re weaving together a network of hubs that provide opportunities for people to contribute and share their gifts in exchange for food & housing.

MORE ON THE HEMPCRETE BUILD

Do you have a desire to learn more about natural building?

Would you like to be involved in co-creating a remarkable, sustainable structure?

Are you looking to enter the natural building industry?

Join us for 3 days of education centered around building with hempcrete - from sourcing the materials to mixing the recipe and installing it - you’ll apply your newfound learnings, meet people who share a common interest, celebrate the epic structure we’ll create together, and leave with skills to build your own structure or business!

We will be casting hempcrete & installing it onto a wall of a Solviva greenhouse, located on a beautiful 26-acre forested property - home to Diggers Compost Cooperative and the Guzman Family Farm, a 50 min drive from Portland, ME, and 2 hours from Boston, MA.

People of all ages over 18 and of all abilities are welcome to attend, including building professionals, natural and green building advocates, and anyone else excited to partake in this special, one of a kind, training and opportunity to gain in-depth knowledge and practical skills. 3 healthy meals per day (Friday - Sunday) are included in your ticket price!

Join a movement focused on creating healthier living spaces that can reverse the damaging effects of CO2 emissions!

More on what you’ll learn:

• Hemp/lime recipes, mixing & application

• The history of hemp and its many potential uses for our modern society - in materials, science, and technology.

• How to forage, harvest, and prepare fresh salads with veggies picked from the garden and with edible plants thriving in the forest around where we’ll be building.

• A unique shuttering / forming system designed by John Patterson

• Retrofitting

• Planning a hempcrete build

• Foundations, framing & roofing

• Permitting structures using natural material

• Permitting for tiny houses

• Fitting into the construction schedule

• Cost of materials and how to source them

• Application methods and scaling up tools for larger projects

• Current opportunities in the natural building industry sector

• The natural building economy!

Join us if you’d like to:

• Start your own hemp construction company or other kind of hemp business that serves a sub-sector or supplier niche

• Become part of global network of hemp builders & entrepreneurs

• Learn to build your own home

• Learn about starting a small hemp farm

• Learn about hemp processing on a small scale

• Get ready for the up-and-coming hemp building workforce

Note: This workshop is designed for up to 25 attendees.

What you’ll also get:

• A hempcrete workbook

• A certificate of completion printed on hemp

• Connections in the natural building and hemp industry sector

• 3 healthy meals per day - Thursday dinner through Sunday lunch (options for gluten free, vegetarian/vegan and other dietary needs accommodated)

• Ecstatic Dance Saturday evening (optional)

Benefits of a Hemp/Lime Construction:

• More comfortable

• Cleaner indoor air

• Fire resistant

• Energy efficient

• Money savings

• Less maintenance

• No mold or mildew

• No pests

• Sequesters carbon

• Reduced illness

Featured Speakers:

• John Patterson of Tiny Hemp Houses

• Ingrid Jay Martin- Plaster Expert -  Northeast Natural Builders Guild

• Scott Guzman of Diggers Cooperative, Permatours & Birds Nest Builders

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SCHEDULE:

~ THURSDAY~

4 PM: Check in, set up your camp and get ready for fun.

6 PM: Opening Circle, followed by dinner

7 PM: Campfire

~ FRIDAY~

9 AM - 10 AM Breakfast & Hempcrete Building Slideshow

10 AM - 12 PM - This will be our first official build day where we’ll focus on getting our build site ready and we’ll install our first few batches of hempcrete. We’ll also learn about safety, the history of hemp building, and the background of the movement to use more hemp. Naturally, we’ll begin to get to know each other, too. 🙂

12 PM - Lunch

1 PM - 5 PM: Plaster class and working in small groups

6 PM: Dinner

7 PM: Campfire & fireside jams

~ SATURDAY ~

8:15 AM: Yoga

9 AM: Breakfast

10 AM to 1 PM: On day 2 we’ll practice the process of setting the forms, preparing the recipes, mixing and installing.

1 PM: Lunch

1 PM to 5 PM: By now, you will have learned about all of the different jobs involved in building with hempcrete. We will hone our skills as we work on the wall application system.

5 PM: Light snacks available before dance

6 PM to 8 PM: Ecstatic Dance (more details below)

8 PM: Dinner & Campfire

9 PM to 12am: DJ dance party

~ SUNDAY~

8:15 AM: Yoga

9 AM: Breakfast

10 AM to 12 PM: We will study the many ways and places to install our system, including installing floors and ceilings.

12 PM to 1 PM : Lunch and closing circle

1 PM to 4:30 PM: Plaster and finishing, bottle wall and continued Hemping

5 PM: Dinner

6 PM: Departure

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ECSTATIC DANCE - Saturday Evening

An ecstatic dance will take place Saturday from 6 to 8 pm and is included with the hempcrete workshop ticket (though of course optional if workshop attendees are not interested). The dance is also available as a stand alone experience, so that non-workshop attendees may participate while also getting the opportunity to check out the ongoing hempcrete solviva greenhouse build. Non-workshop ecstatic dancers are welcome on the land starting at 5 pm to have time to settle in and check out the build before the dance begins.

We will circle for the ecstatic dance at 6 pm, with an opportunity for everyone to briefly introduce themselves and make agreements for the ecstatic dance. Then we will dance to ecstatic beats. Following the dance, we will have a brief sharing circle and then dinner will be served around the campfire. After dinner, there is always potential for a song circle or jam session to emerge.

About Ecstatic Dance: This is a time to reconnect with our bodies and each other. Ecstatic dance provides a safe space to release judgements about what dance should look like and enjoy the feeling of allowing the vibrations to move through us. We dance without conversation or phones in order to drop deeper into our bodies and the meditation of the dance. If anyone feels called to dance with others, we always make sure to get consent from the other human, through nonverbal communication or quick verbal consent conversations if needed. Consent will be elaborated on during the opening circle. Dancing is medicine! A recent study suggests that dancing is a more effective treatment for depression than any other treatment method studied, including SSRIs and exercise combined.

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Dog Policy:

Furry friends are strongly discouraged, with the exception of certified service animals (who must remain on leash and check in with us first please).

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SCHOLARSHIP & WORK TRADE OPPORTUNITIES:

Apply here for a Scholarship.

Apply here for work trade opportunities.

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RV Accommodations

If you're planning to join us in an RV, please note that we do not have electrical hookups. Please let us know early if you'd like to reserve a spot.

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Learn more about our workshop guides Ingrid Jay Martin and Scotty Guzman of Northeast Natural Builders Guild:

Ingrid Jay Martin is a co-founder of the Northeast Natural Builders Guild, bringing seventeen years of experience in sustainable design and construction. She has been specializing in clay and lime plasters since 2019, developing expertise in  recipe development, application, and finishing techniques. As our resident plaster master, Ingrid brings experience with plastering straw bale construction, hemp/lime construction, wattle and daub and applying natural plasters over drywall in conventional structures. You will  learn how plaster contributes to the thermal performance of shelters in the northeast, and how to plan and select recipes for a project. We will show off a selection of the tools used by professional plasterers and go over mixing best practices. Then we will bring our selves, our tools, and our mix to the wall to experience the wonder and joy of applying scratch and finish coats of lime plaster to fully cured Hempcrete.

Scotty is a natural builder, compost educator, and farmer with a degree in chemical engineering and 12 years of experience in the world of cooperative business. He is co-founder of Birds Nest Builders- A cooperatively owned natural building business specializing in yurts, saunas, tiny homes, decks and domes. He is also co-founder of Diggers Cooperative, a local Maine compost and permaculture design business. And as co-founder of the permaculture education group, Permatours, Scotty travels around the Northeast to joyfully share educational content on various topics such as building science, Hempcrete, soil science and foraging wild edibles. 

And our Lead Educator, John Patterson:

Industrial Hemp: The Future of Green Building

Hempcrete Fire Test

This Guy Makes Houses From Hemp

Colorado builder envisions hemp in commercial buildings

John Patterson is a natural builder, carpenter, and educator who has spent more than 20 years working with hemp-lime construction and other natural building materials. He built and lived in his own off-grid home, raised a family there, and has dedicated much of his life to exploring practical, sustainable ways of living.

This year marks John's fourth trip to Maine to teach hemp building. Along the way, he has helped develop a motivated team of builders and foster a growing community of hemp enthusiasts and natural builders. Many of those connections have extended beyond the U.S., including collaborative projects and workshops in Mexico.

Known for his hands-on, down-to-earth teaching style, John enjoys helping people gain the confidence to build with natural materials and discover what's possible when people come together around a shared vision.

John is also the founder of Tiny Hemp Homes, whose mission is to encourage healthier, more comfortable and efficient homes, work and play places through cultivating a more natural built environment. “Through mindfully crafted multiple day experiences we aim to connect people from around the globe to initiate significant global transformation for the better of the people and the planet. We encourage people to have a deeper relationship with mother earth and fellow inhabitants leading a more vibrant and sustainable life.”

John speaks about improved building systems, getting permission to build, land use restrictions, holistic income opportunities, community gardens, problem solving, preparedness and more affordable living.

Further accomplishments, experiences, and speaking gigs include:

• Steve Allin’s Hemp Building Course June 2012

• Ignite Fort Collins Hemp - Little Johnny Hemp Seed

• Testifying on behalf of industrial hemp at the Colorado State Capitol

• Hood Lab Hands on Hemp hempcrete demonstration

• Speaker at the Fort Collins Library Hemp Rope not Dope

• Speaker at the Fort Collins Sertoma Club explaining hemp for building

• Speaker at Hemp Seed Revival Festival

• Jared Polis Hemp Symposium educational vendor

• Arise Festival Loveland Colorado 1 and 2 Hempcrete seminar

• Hosted Steve Allin author of “Building With Hemp” in my home

• Tiny House Project Build for Steve Allin’s 3 day course in Colorado

• Taught 2 day Hempcrete workshop

• NOCO Hemp Expo 1 and 2 educational demonstration

• Doug Fine's Sante-fe New Mexico Carbon Economy Series

• Colorado Hemp Awards Festival

• Taught 2-day hempcrete workshop with 25 attendees.

• Opening Day Speaker at the US Cannabis Expo

• East Coast Hemp History Week Tour and Washington Lobbying for Hemp

• Industrial Hemp Field Tour with NE legislators

• Hemp Building Workshop with National Hemp Association, Denver, CO

• Hemp building workshops in Pennsylvania, Grand Rapids Michigan, & Lincoln, Nebraska

• Hemp Building in Poland: Featured speaker November 2015

• National Hemp Association Speaker January 2016

• NOCO Expo 3 Keynote Workshop Presenter

• University of North Texas Engineering Department- February 2016

• NOCO Hemp Expo 4

• 2-day hemp building Experience- Left Hand Hemp

• 2-day Hemp Building Experience- Left Hand Hemp

• 3-day Hemp Building Experience-

• Living Simple- Tiny Houses festival

• Consulting a school bus to tiny house conversion

• Consulting for quonset hut hemp retrofit

• Consulting in Wishart, Saskatchewan Canada

• 2-day hemp building experience- Hemp Today West Office

• 2-day Hemp building experience- Nipton, California

• Sustainable Living Fair Speaker

• Earth Day Fort Collins Speaker

• NOCO Hemp Expo 5

• SLV Hemp Symposium Panelist

• Earth X- Dallas Earth day celebration

• EDTX Talk

• Self-reliance Expo- Dallas Texas

• Consultant at the Quonset Hut Hemp Farm

• Leader for Tour de hemp

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More on Permatours:

Permatours produces transformational, community-driven events focused on permaculture action and natural building to foster food sovereignty and housing justice.

Permatours empowers people to forage, grow, & otherwise sustainably source their own food through educational workshops & connection to hyperlocal networks that exist outside of corporatized food systems.

Another major component of Permatours is the network it is building of land owners & non-land owners aligned around principles of sustainable living, natural construction, & community, thereby empowering people to navigate housing opportunities for themselves through peer-to-peer support. Learn more here.

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ADDRESS:

Please register for the address.

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PERMATOURS EVENT AGREEMENTS:

We value active participation in all facets of Earth Care, People Care, and Fair Share.

We treat the land and all beings with love and respect.

We do not tolerate hate language, discrimination, or violence of any kind.

We support an accessible and equitable environment for all beings.

Equality is not an assumption, and we strive to promote equitable access.

Consent is required for all: commitments (including time/energy expectations),

verbal interactions, physical contact, emotional support, desire for intimacy, etc.

We encourage curiosity to be a leader against assumptions.

We support the use of the acronym FRIES to share concisely that consent is:

F - freely given

R - reversible

I - informed

E - enthusiastic

S - specific

Permatours is dedicated to holding containers (intentional spaces) that remain free of alcohol,

powders, pills, and gasses. Your presence, in times of joy and difficulty, is welcome here!

We support a space of interdependence, and mutual aid. We trust that when we arrive and

are able to do for ourselves what we can, with the interstanding we may not be able to do

everything, we are better aligned to receive the aid we truly need, and aid others in areas of

their needs. Building mutually beneficial relationships and working together in symbiosis are

key aspects of being able to thrive physically, emotionally, and spiritually, as a community.

We support a space of radical self-reliance, encouraging everyone to show up able to meet

most, if not all, of their own needs. The community is here to support them when/if needed.

We observe the 4 Agreements, with the inclusion of the 5th agreement, by Don Miguel Ruiz.

1. Be impeccable with your word.

2. Don’t take anything personally.

3. Don’t make any assumptions.

4. Always do your best.

5. Be skeptical, but learn to listen.

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Thank you! We hope to see you there!

With gratitude,

Permatours & Crew

Permatoursplanet@gmail.com