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Philosophy

Change requires a response. Our landscapes, the people and nature within them and the economies they support are changing rapidly. Lifescape – your landscape is a response to that change. It seeks to meet this challenge by bringing people together across national boundaries to generate innovation, establish best practice, and demonstrate a successful approach. Lifescape at one level, therefore, involves human nature and is about exploring the connection that people have, or could have, with each other and with the landscapes around them. At another level it is about making use of these connections and  applying them to real life examples of managing the rural landscape in a sustainable way.

The Lifescape challenge Our landscape is changing. The distribution of wildlife and the texture of the landscape are the product of complex interactions. The basic physical qualities of rock, soil, and climate have set the scene, but the detail has been shaped through millennia of human activity, past and present land use and management, and its associated impacts; not least by the age-old practice of farming. So when you next look out over the countryside and marvel at its natural beauty you have to remember - it is far from natural. To a large extent it is cultured and man-made. Read more...

The Lifescape logic In order to bridge the gap between ecology and economy, Lifescape combines ‘livelihood’ and ‘landscape’, the individual benefit and the common good, in one concept. Our life and our landscape are two sides of the same coin. Read more...

The Lifescape approach Lifescape is a work in progress. It is a work which is never complete, a never ending story, because the andscape, its people, and their relationships are continuously changing. Read more...