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A brief summary in english

The basics about us; the ecovillage, our ecovillage association and the farm



Kurjen tila – Community village and a biodynamic farm

Kurjen tila (a free translation of this name would be "the Crane Farm")  is located in Western Finland by the lake Pyhäjärvi, ca 170 km from the Finnish capital Helsinki. There is public transport to the farm, although connections are somewhat limited.

The history of the farm can be traced back all the way to the 13th century. In March 2011 the farm was bought by four families with a vision: they wanted to turn it into a biodynamic farm and build an ecological community village alongside it. Since then, ground has been broken on five house construction sites in the village. First three of these houses are already inhabited by the families building them.

The farm consists of the main building (1923) and various farm buildings with a welcoming old garden between them. South of the main building lays the village itself, currently there are five new houses being built by the families in the community. The farm has 200 meters of shoreline.

the farm

The farm cultivates roughly 30 hectares of biodynamically-maintained fields and natural pastures. For domestic animals, there are between 16-20 heads of finncattle, some 20 finnsheep ewe's and around 20 hens. On top of that, there are several cats and dogs aswell.

The farm is managed by Ari and Ira Hellstén. Ari manages the arable farming, whereas Ira is a gardener. Animal care is done together. Gardening work, weeding and harvesting are a matter of great importance in the year cycle of the farm. All these seasonal duties are open for the people of the village and surrounding areas to attend.

The underlying idea with the farm is to enrich the life of the villagers and and visitors of Kurjen tila around the year. The primary goal of course being the production of first-class biodynamic produce, be it carrots, cabbage or beef.


The land and co-used buildings on the farm are owned by Kurki Farm Ltd. Families moving into the village pay a rent for their building lots and each family will build their own house. There will be eight new buildings and the existing two houses will house one family each. All in all there will be 10 households residing in the village.

the eco-village association

The eco-village association of Kurjen Tila organizes cultural, social and international projects at the estate. The association arranges activities such as the harvest fair in the fall, different types of events for children as well as the entry of foreign voluntary workers to Kurjen Tila.

Alongside these self-organized events, different artists, musicians and actors hold their show's in our milieu. Volunteering in kurjen tila

information about the voluntary work in our community




European Voluntary Service (EVS) is an EU-funded program through which young people 17 to 30 years can do voluntary work in a foreign country. The EVS funding covers accommodation, food, insurance, pocket money, and most of the traveling costs.


Kurjen Tila has offered EVS volunteering opportunities as a host organisation since 2013. We have had total of 33 EVS-volunteers from 9 countries. Our next project lasts one year and starts in April 2018. It is named EMPOWERMENT THROUGH COMMUNITY, CULTURE AND CULTIVATION 3. If you are interested to join, please contact us soon! We are now looking for candidates from Portugal, Italy and France. Emails to address: kurjenekokylayhdistys (at) gmail.com

volunteering in kurjen tila eco-village


The volunteers work for the community around 34 hours per week from Tuesday to Saturday, and they will get 12 days of vacation in addition to free weekends. The volunteers will receive a pocket money of 125 euros per month in addition to accommodation, food, necessary traveling, and other necessities.

job description

We offer an opportunity to learn through working and living together with different people living in our community. Volunteers will gain new experiences by participating in the everyday chores of our village, from cooking and ecological building to animal care. Our volunteers will also help organize events like seasonal fairs. A major cornerstone in our project is the cultivation of our land and ourselves; bringing the food to the table all the way from planting the seeds through weeding and finally harvesting the crops.

living conditions

The volunteers will be living in our community house, pictured in the background image of this page. The immediate surrounding area is peaceful countryside of Vesilahti. Vesilahti is a nice small municipality of roughly 4500 residents, 35 kilometers from the third biggest city of Finland, Tampere. Kurjen Tila has strong connections with Tampere, most of our residents are employed within the city. You can research the surrounding area through google maps here.

Public transport between Vesilahti and Tampere is solid, but if the need arises we have a car permanently in the use of our volunteers.

the blog

Our volunteers from previous years have all been writing on this blog, go check it out!