Profile information
Host rating
100 %
Last replied
4 Jun 2025
Reply rate
92.6 %
Usually responds within 3 days
Feedback
2
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Details
Description
We are Bart and Hester. In 2022 we moved from Amsterdam to the rural area around Middelbeers to start a food forest. A food forest, if you haven’t heard of the concept before, is a place where trees, shrubs and multi annual plants form a self-sustaining ecological system that provides food for people and animals. Our food forest is designed to contribute to biodiversity, store CO2 and provide a wide diversity of food.
We are tremendously enjoying living closer to nature and learning more about it every day. We’d like to share that experience with others and also to share what we’ve learned about food forests so far with those interested.
Our home is right next to the forest and a renovated traditional farmhouse, originally built in 1848.
Types of help and learning opportunities
Help with Eco Projects
Gardening
DIY and building projects
Farmstay help
Help around the house
General Maintenance
UN sustainability goals this host is trying to achieve
Cultural exchange and learning opportunities
In our ‘former lives’ in Amsterdam and abroad, we were used to meeting a lot of different people. We do miss that sometimes and are looking forward to doing that again in our own home 😊
If you’re interested in preparing, preserving and fermenting food and drinks, we’ll be happy to share what we’ve learned, and eager to learn what you might know about your country’s or your personal specialties. Some of the food we grow in our forest is better known in other countries than here, so we’re very interested in everything you can teach us about them.
Help
We started growing our forest in 2022, and planted around 1500 trees and shrubs since. We are looking for help planting new trees and shrubs, attending to the ones that are already there, creating micro bio systems, generally all kinds of work that sees to growing and maintaining the forest. The help we need could be quite heavy at times - nice if you are up to that. Think regular gardening but on a larger scale.
We enjoy sharing what we’ve learned about food forests and biodiversity. We’ll often be working with you but not all the time, since we also have regular (parttime) jobs to attend to.
We could also use help in the general maintenance of our farm house, but that will only be a large part of your work when this interests you and has been agreed upon beforehand. Or perhaps when it’s really too rainy to work outside 😉
Languages spoken
English: Fluent
Dutch: Fluent
German: Intermediate
Accommodation
Workawayers stay in a former art studio in our farm house. It’s a beautiful and quite big (70m2) space but as yet relatively sparsely decorated (see photos). The studio has two single beds and has its own bathroom.
Meals provided are vegetarian and biological.
What else ...
Where we live is about as remote as it gets in The Netherlands (which is not very remote ;-)) There is a lot of nature around at walking or cycling distance. If you can’t bring a bike, you’re welcome to borrow ours. The village of Middelbeers is about 2 kilometers away, the bigger villages Oirschot and Hilvarenbeek around 10, and the cities of Eindhoven and Tilburg 23 kilometers. Public transport is available but it does take quite a long time to get anywhere, and even less available in the evenings and weekends. You’ll be most happy here if you enjoy being outdoors, hiking or cycling in the area or working or relaxing in our growing forest.
We have a young cat, Minou who loves the company of people.
A little more information
Internet access
Limited internet access
We have pets
We are smokers
Can host families
Can host digital nomads
We have a high speed internet connection. We both often work from home and we’ve never had problems. The studio where you’ll be staying is big, 70 m2, and has two tables and chairs. The tables are just tables but two chairs have adjustable heights, so you should even be able to create an ergonomically sound work place.
Space for parking camper vans
Your camper can be parked on our terrain. You could use facilities in the house and sleep in your camper.
How many Workawayers can stay?
Two
Feedback (2)
Fiast of all, they explained to me how is the their project “making food forest” and I helped that. They already planted plenty of trees so I just helped to make soil better. It was so nice to work in the field with Bart, he is calm, warm and looks he is enjoying the gardening from bottom of his heart. He is an… read more
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Fiast of all, they explained to me how is the their project “making food forest” and I helped that. They already planted plenty of trees so I just helped to make soil better. It was so nice to work in the field with Bart, he is calm, warm and looks he is enjoying the gardening from bottom of his heart. He is an… read more
