SEDA’s 2026 Conference Reflections
From the 18th to the 20th of September, the Scottish Ecological Design Association (SEDA) animated and lit up the grounds of the Falkland Estate with a rich plurality of ecologically-rooted activity for their 2026 conference: Common Ground - Land, Buildings, Stories and the Care We Share. After a warm welcome, traditional conference proceedings as you may have experienced elsewhere blossomed into a lively confluence of complementary workshop sessions, panel discussions and talks punctuated by poetry, stories and song, anchored around plenty of time for catching up or connecting with one's fellow attendees during shared meal times. Its 3-day programme fused demonstrations of, and learning about, what’s possible with celebrations of our collective heritage and possible - more regenerative, futures, and was choreographed with and grounded in tangible sense of care.
Friday’s first fascinating talk on the Intangible culture of drystane dyking from Niamh MacKenzie set the day’s tone before we broke into four groups for a morning of practical, hands-on learning. Whilst Alex Sparrow and Elliot Payne were covering the basic principles of building with hempcrete - a dynamic bioaggregate made by mixing the woody stem of industrial hemp plants with a lime binder and water, Becky Little was encouraging their group to get acquainted and familiar with the multiplicity of different properties of soils and clays as part of their earth building session. A third group was introduced to the physical practice of drystane dyking by Kirstie and Luke De Garri, whilst the fourth were led and guided in the craft of willow weaving by Max Johnson.
After lunch together, attendees regrouped to rotate around another set of the morning's four parallel workshop offerings, albeit in significantly more dreich and livelier weather conditions the second time around. After the workshops, we gathered again in the Stables, and Ryan Dziadowiec then gave his talk on the theme of the Gaelic concept of belonging, Dùthchas, before leading the room into song. Mike Delaitre and Simon Whatley then introduced the Curious Conversations that led to their Vessel artwork coming into being through the fusion of their backgrounds, cultures, artistic practices and craft. After dinner, I ended the first day, and marked my 10th year as a SEDA member, with a session on Prefigurative Practice - the ethic and practice, much like Prefigurative Politics, of embodying, learning and working with others in ways that prefigure, build towards, and create momentary experiences of, the kinds of futures we hope to see, rather than resigning to worst case scenarios and business-as-usual, drawing on and sharing examples of my own work, workshops, and stories of the possible.
Over the following two days there were: even more of a multiplicity of workshops, talks and panel discussions; artistic contributions of poetry and song; a Council of All Beings; presentations from the shortlisted students and the awarding of the Kristina and Jim Johnson Award - encouraging and recognising ecological design excellence in 2nd year architecture student projects; a guided walk of the Falkland Estate; and the premiere of 2045: The Big Conversation - The Movie - that tells the story of SEDA’s Scottish government-funded series of Just Transition in construction events that covered a broad range of themes in 2024.
You can find out about upcoming SEDA events here.
You can find out more about the SEDA Conference 2026 Programme here.
Scott McAulay