The OneClimate Centre

A climate-nature community resource centre  

As the climate-nature polycrisis presses ever closer, more and more of us are seeking urgent solutions. Some of us want practical know-how, like how (or whether) to change our heating system or our car, or how we could share food that would otherwise go to waste. Others want to understand the Big Picture of global issues and solutions. Still others want a more resilient sense of community, so we feel less vulnerable, less powerless, than if we are coping alone.

OneClimate is a community of communities. And the OneClimate Centre includes a warm and vibrant space where people gather to share their knowledge, ideas, and feelings about how to face the new future – with room for realistic fears as well as realistic hopes.

It also includes two cinemas:

  • Outdoors, in the natural amphitheatre in our beechwoods, up to 100 people can see documentaries about nature, climate or democratic voice while seated amongst the trees…
  • Indoors, in the Secret Cinema in the Woods, up to 30 people can see these films on a luminous screen with very high-quality sound and vision.As we are filmmakers, you can also see the climate films we’ve made ourselves, like The Sequel, about how to build resilient communities in the face of climate collapse, or The Energy Internet, about a visionary supergrid project that enables renewable energy to be shared around the world. NB This supergrid project was handpicked for COP26, and launched there by heads of state – and is now being implemented around the world.Or you can join ‘watch parties’ where we not only see a  film but have discussions with the stars of the film, or its director or writer, who are present either in person or virtually.

There’s lots more too! Like…

  • The Deep Time Walk through Hedgerley Wood offers walkers a way to experience the age of Planet Earth and the aeons it has taken for various forms of life to evolve, from bacteria to dinosaurs to humans. Every step you take equals 10 million years.
    Visitors from schools or environmental groups, or interested individuals, can follow up this experience with films and discussions in the Secret Cinema.
  • The Centre is fully wired so – to take just one example – students at the Secret Cinema could talk to fellow-students in Africa or Asia, asking them in person what the climate crisis means to them, bringing the reality of life in other parts of the world into their experience without emitting more carbon by flying there.
  • A beautiful and unique digital phenomenon is the Mosaic Earth. It enables each of us to send our politicians brief video messages telling them what we are doing for the climate and also letting them know what we need them to do – and urgently.
  • In development is our latest innovation: the Mycelium Map. It is an interactive platform  that displays the action groups and sustainable businesses,in the Chilterns area, with their wide range of climate-nature initiatives. You’ll soon be able to just touch the screen to check out the details of each initiative – and more. So if your organisation is taking action for climate and/or biodiversity in the Chilterns, let us know, so that we can use the Map to promote the good work you are doing.

But perhaps the most surprising thing about the small cottage that houses the OneClimate Centre is that it has always been an international gathering place from the day it was built, back in the 1940s.

This is how it began: back in World War II, the Ministry of Education built it as a schoolhouse for 45 girls and boys – for evacuees from Scandinavia and Nazi-occupied Europe, as well as children from the nearby village of Bledlow Ridge.

This mix of education and global inclusion has continued at Hedgerley Wood ever since. There are a great many stories to tell, but for now, let’s jump to the mid-1990s.

In 1994, it was the birthplace of OneWorld Online, the world’s first-ever portal for sustainable human development and global justice. OneWorld’s innovative public education services reached multi-millions of people all over the world. And even back then, the unfolding climate crisis was our top editorial preoccupation.

In 2013, in memory of our youngest daughter Boo Armstrong, we founded the Hedgerley Wood Trust, a charity focused on public education about the health of the planet and its people.

By 2020, the warning lights about the climate crisis were blazing bright red. Millions of people were already suffering climate-induced starvation as crops failed. If tipping points are passed in 2030, billions of people will be at risk of death.

In spring 2022, we decided to create the OneClimate Centre, focusing our efforts on educating the public about climate justice and nature justice, and gathering together all the ways in which everyone can participate in decelerating this catastrophe as fast as we all can.

Contact Peter (peter@hedgerleywood.org) or Anuradha (anuradha@hedgerleywood.org) to find out more.