Design
The site is based around the Danish co-housing model: mixing people’s needs for their own space in private homes with shared facilities and encouraging social interaction. Our green spaces – allotments, pond, a shared garden and a children’s play area – are also important to community interaction. The common house is at the heart of the community, and includes communal cooking and eating facilities, laundry facilities, meeting space, play area, office and guest rooms.
Food
We meet twice a week to eat together in the Common House: the time we spend relaxing over our meals, or working together to produce them creates spaces to talk and share and build the links that help sustain our community. We also host a delivery hub for several cooperatives and smaller organic suppliers. In the Common House we have a shared kitchen and a pantry for food bought in bulk. We organise skills share workshops around food and learn new ways to source and prepare food.
Wider Community
LILAC is also part of a flourishing neighbourhood in West Leeds.
We want to be a resource for the wider community for events and facilities. The common house is used for local meetings, film nights, meals and gatherings, workshops and has been used as the local polling station.