The Farm
Programs
Get Involved
Support Our Work
Newsletters
Photo Gallery
Useful Links
Home

Facilitators for Natural Building Workshops:

Jim Haim of Cob Together

James has experience building with straw bales, cob, paper-crete, and light-straw clay, as well as conventional construction. He co-founded the Wilderness Charter School in 1996 whose mission is to study and practice community, personal empowerment, and ecological connection with the intention of creating a sustainable future. Between 1996-2003 he served on the board of Harvest Built Homes and currently serves on boards for Earth Car International and White Oak Farm. He lives in the beautiful Williams Valley with his wife, daughter, father-in-law and friends. Jim believes that a key element in the environmental movement is creating an example of sustainable culture so others have inspiration to look towards as their awareness of the world's environmental and social situation unfolds.

Taylor Starr of White Oak Farm

Taylor is the co-founder of White Oak Farm & Education Center in Williams, Oregon. The Farm is a non-profit center dedicated to creating connections between people and their local ecosystems. White Oak serves a working organic farm, children's education center, and host for adult workshops in natural building and permaculture. Taylor has spent the last six years farming, homesteading, teaching, and building. He has worked with cob, straw bale, light straw-clay, earthen plasters and floors, and round wood. Over the past three seasons he has focused his energy building a hybrid pole frame-straw bale-cob octagon to serve as the common house for White Oak Farm, as well as various outbuildings and cabins. Taylor believes working in community to grow food and create shelter should be empowering, inspiring and fun.

White Oak Farm:
White Oak Farm is a non-profit farm and education center located in the beautiful and biologically diverse Siskiyou Mountains. The farm is situated on a gentle south-east facing slope, surrounded by forests of pine, oak, madrone, and douglas fir. We are blessed with three ponds for irrigation, swimming and wildlife habitat, a one acre organic garden, pastures, an orchard of over forty fruit tree varieties, ample space for camping and hiking, a communal kitchen, two yurts for staff housing, outdoor showers and composting toilets. The farm is currently home to five staff, forty chickens, and many thousands of honey bees.

Accommodations and Meals:
Workshop participants have their choice between numerous shady campsites among the trees and ponds on the Farm. There are hot showers, compost toilets, and swimming ponds for cooling off after a long day.

Three organic home-cooked (and often home-grown) meals are provided each day by the White Oak Farm staff. Meals are vegetarian, and other diets can be accommodated with advanced notice.

Travel:
White Oak Farm is situated in the foothills of the Siskiyou Mountains in beautiful Williams, Oregon. The farm is 6 hours north of San Francisco, 5 hours south of Portland, and 1 hour West of Ashland and Medford, Oregon. There is air and bus service to Medford from many major cities across the US. We are happy to arrange shuttles to the farm from the airport or bus station. Because of limited parking space and our desire to decrease consumption of fossil fuels we encourage participants to use carpools, public transit, bicycles, and other creative means of travel. Please contact us to help arrange carpools.