Only 5,000 signatures remain for the petition launched a month ago by the Domaine de Boisbuchet, an international center for design and architecture research in the southwest of France, founded in 1986 by German collector Alexander von Vegesack.

The campus surrounded by 150 hectares of protected nature is threatened by a pig fattening farm project, the building permit of which was granted in June 2020, on a land directly adjacent to the central district of Boisbuchet. This facility will be located just 170 meters from the campus.

Here are Boisbuchet team’s few words, right after the petition launching, which is still available on Change.org.

“Dear Friends,

First of all, a huge thank you – for your help, your comments, your ideas and your warm moral support! Today our petition has reached over 20.000 signatures and besides being quite overwhelmed we are more than encouraged.

When we started Boisbuchet 30 years ago, the idea was an open-air design laboratory in the countryside, gathering people from different cultures and backgrounds in an inspiring, green environment. And while this beautiful and rich territory in the Southwest of France motivated creativity year after year, Boisbuchet in return made the Charente what is today an international hub for design and architecture. Design is about finding solutions for problems that concern us as individuals, our societies and the larger organism we are living in. These are most crucial and most complex tasks and this year in particular all of us had to realize this dependence of our physical and social milieu. Boisbuchet is made to address precisely such problems and it provides the platforms allowing a creative approach to solutions – for the society at large as well as for our direct surroundings.

In our current conflict regarding a pig fattening farm next door we are acting in that same spirit: we will send all your signatures to the Minister of Culture in order to have a common agreement that respects our community and we won’t give up here. We believe in our mission and we will, of course, continue to gather creative minds and hands in nature: “Energies & Synergies – A revival” is the title for our workshop program next summer which we are going to publish next week. We are also preparing two exhibitions for the summer, the residencies for creatives, a rich program that is waiting for designers, architects, creatives, children, visitors, and the great public – from all over the world and from around the corner.

Thanks again for your support and please take care; we hope to see you very soon at Boisbuchet!

The Boisbuchet Team”

Boisbuchet has also made public its 2021 Summer Worshop. 2021 marks Boisbuchet’s thirtieth anniversary! More information on the official website.

“After a year of disconnection and readjustment we are ready to set out for the future. Celebrating Boisbuchet’s 30th anniversary, distinguished thinkers and makers will gather for a summer programme that flags projections for the next steps of our lives. They will connect disciplines and cultures with hands-on experimentation of new designs that shall inspire the coming 30 years. Join and explore the abundance of energies that nature and people create: sun, wind, and water, efficient solutions of plants and animals, hands and minds learning from each other, and the power of cooperation – for living better together.”