Experience community life with gardening and healthy living
from March 16th to April 6th 2026:
A three week EVS (European Voluntary Service) activity
near Berlin in Germany
www.unavision.eu
Invitation
We invite you to embark on this community experience to work with us to prepare a bio-diverse garden to increase the self-sufficiency of our Gut Herzershof community. Experience what it means to get into deep contact with nature – within and around us – co-creating with the web of life a place where we can feel nurtured and fulfilled. Doing this we come back to the center of what it means to be alive, being who we truly are. Respect for each other and every form of life is the core of this state. Learning to act from this place is what we aim to do while working. Recovering work as a practice which connects us instead of alienating us from ourselves and the world we belong to.
Our common Journey
We will get up with some morning exercises, housekeeping and three to four hours daily garden work. The EVS team takes care of the cooking. During the afternoon and evenings you are offered to organize or participate in activities such as yoga, meditation, creating mosaics, learning about nature, dreaming sessions, synergetics and philosophical discussions. During one weekend you may also participate in building a sweat lodge and shamanic travelling and learn folk and ball dances.
We are looking for open-minded, curious and motivated individuals who want to contribute to a vibrant collective experience – aligned with the values of sustainability, solidarity and mutual respect …
Come, build with us, grow with us and explore what it means to live and work together with resilience, purpose, and joy!
Transportation – Accommodation – Food
The activity will take place at Gut Herzershof:
Herzershof 10, 15328 Küstriner Vorland, Germany.
The accommodation will be with shared rooms and shared bathrooms and toilets. Have a look at our pictures:
Photos Herzershof – UnaVision
Gut Herzershof located 90 km east of Berlin is a learning location about resilient living. We are co-creating a living ecosystem, where learning and un-learning becomes an agile, flexible, and self-organized system with a flat, non-hierarchical structure coordinated through sociocratic principles and shared ownership. Everyone contributes to maintaining the ecosystem through small, fair contributions, making it sustainable and inclusive.
At the moment, the Gut Herzershof community consists of 8 people. Your hosts for this EVS event are Sophie and Uta.
Dates
* Arrival at Gut Herzershof: Monday, March 16th 2026, afternoon
* Program: from Tuesday March 17th to Sunday April 5th 2026
* Departure: Monday, April 6th after breakfast
In case your connections on Sundays are not good, you are welcome to come a day earlier or stay a day longer at no additional cost.
Group Chat and UnaVision Platform
UnaVision Platform: https://unavision-network.mn.co/share/Mn-pGHYiPwyT4ODW?utm_source=manual
Please register yourself, fill out your profile and upload a photo. Then register at the 2025 EVS Pop-up village event.
WhatsApp Chat: We will start a WhatsApp group chat as soon as we have your mobile numbers.
European Youth Portal registration
You need to be registered at the European Youth Portal in order to participate. Please do so as soon as possible! Your PRN is required to finalize the technical preparation.
https://youth.europa.eu/solidarity/young-people/about_en
Volunteering Agreement
Within the European Solidarity Corps, a volunteering agreement has to be signed. Please provide us with the answers in this form to prepare the agreement as well as some other aspects of your stay. The agreement will then be sent to you for review and signature.
https://forms.office.com/e/2qBW69wF1s
Food
We cook vegetarian, organic food. Most of the food is from regional farms or a bio certified supplier. The cooking team will serve the food on the buffet in the community room. If needed, there is gluten free bread. You can drink the tap water at our location.
All day long you will have access to coffee, tea, syrup and water. If needed, you can purchase other drinks at the local supermarket EDEKA, which is 2 km away.
Planned eating times are mentioned below. Please stick to the times to enable the cooking-kitchen team to participate in the activities.
* Breakfast from 07:15 h to 08:15 h
* Lunch from 13:30 to 14:15 h
* Dinner from 19:00 to 19:45 h
Accommodation, sleeping and hygiene
You will have shared hostel style sleeping rooms with 12, 8, 4 or 3 beds. The rooms are separated for female and male participants. You will find these rooms on the ground and first floor of the former farm building. We provide beddings and towels.
There are male and female showers with toilets on the ground floor and additional toilets on the first floor.
Please bring house shoes or slippers for the indoor activities.
Use of shampoo, soap and detergents
We have a plant based sewage treatment plant. We are not using any chemicals for dishwashing or body cleaning. You will be provided with soap and shampoo for your cleaning purposes. You do not need to bring these.
Washing Cloths
We have a washing machine and a dryer. Please combine the washing with several people (8kg) to wash together. We will explain to you how the machine works.
Smoking – Alcohol
Smoking is not allowed in the buildings. We have smoking areas outside at the veranda of the community building and the terrace of the farm building.
Please do not consume alcoholic beverages during the week. A moderate and conscious consumption during the weekend parties is fine.
Team of EVS program
Manuela of pewobe g GmbH takes care of all financial questions, settlements and reimbursement of travel costs. All technical questions regarding the volunteering agreement, management in the European Youth Portal as well as finances will be handled by pewobe g GmbH.
Johannes and the Gut Herzershof team coordinate the activities at Gut Herzershof.
Activities are conducted by Ana (kitchen, baking), Johannes (individual and team development and topic offerings), Sascha (atelier, art, mosaic, frame printing), Sophie (Yoga, garden) and Uta (atelier and garden)
Manuela Demel, Mail: demel@pewobe-ffo.de, Mobil +49 (173) 425 8016
Johannes Pfister, Mail: johannes.pfister@thinkcamp.eu, Mobil: +49 (172) 862 8947
Location and Transportation
The location of Gut Herzershof is 90 km east of Berlin, Germany. The address is:
Herzershof 10, 15328 Küstriner Vorland
The next bus station is "Herzershof Küstriner Vorland" 500 meter from our location. It is served by bus 969 from Frankfurt (Oder) or from Bahnhof Küstrin Kietz.
The next train station is "Gorgast Bahnhof Küstriner Vorland" at a distance of 3.5 km. Walking time is about 40 minutes.
The EDEKA supermarket is 2 km away in the next village of Manschnow. Next to the EDEKA is also a drug store, post office and Kebab.
Arriving at the Airport Berlin-Brandenburg or Berlin Hauptbahnhof
There are frequent trains from the Berlin-Brandenburg Airport to Berlin Ostkreuz, where you have to change. The duration is about 20 minutes.
From Berlin Hauptbahnhof you can take the S-Bahn to Berlin Ostkreuz (about 15 minutes).
To travel to Gut Herzershof, there are two possibilities.
Alternative-1 from Berlin Ostkreuz
From Berlin Ostkreuz you can take the train RB-26 towards Kostrzyn (PL). The station stop is "Gorgast Bahnhof". The ride takes 1:10 h. Departures on Saturday or Sunday afternoon are:
* Departure 15:33 h – Arrival 16:43 h
* Departure 17:33 h – Arrival 18:43 h
* Departure 19:33 h – Arrival 20:43 h
To walk from the Gorgast train station to Gut Herzershof is 3.5 km or 40 minutes. We will pick you up at the station.
Alternative-2 from Berlin Ostkreuz (or Hauptbahnhof)
Alternatively you can choose the combination train and bus directly to Herzershof bus stations. In that case you take the train RE-1 from Berlin Ostkreuz to Frankfurt (Oder) at 12:32 h or 16:32 h, change in Frankfurt (Oder) to take the Bus 969 to Herzershof.
Going Home on the last day
Trains for Berlin departing on Sundays are at 06:15h, 08:15h, 10:15h or 12:15h.
Finances, Tickets and reimbursement
Please send you tickets and all related documents to projekte@pewobe-ffo.de
The costs in Germany for accommodation and the activities are covered by the fund of the European Commission. You will also be signed up for the group insurance provided by the European Solidarity Corps. According to the rules within the European Solidarity Corps we will reimburse the travel costs on the basis of the cheapest and safest possibilities, e.g. second class railway tickets, APEX-flights etc., accompanied by the receipt of complete and original tickets, invoices, bills, receipts, boarding cards etc. upon a certain "contribution to the travel costs of participants, from their place of origin to the venue of the activity and return". This contribution is "based on the travel distance per participant. Travel distances must be calculated using the distance calculator supported by the European Commission".
All financial details as well as other obligations from all sides will be clarified in a personal volunteering agreement between pewobe, Herzershof and each volunteer. The draft for this agreement will be sent after you submit your details through the form above.
The team of Manuela will handle the reimbursement and also your pocket money for the stay. You will receive the pocket money during your stay. The reimbursement of travel costs will be done when all necessary documents are submitted. It is important that original documents are collected and submitted during your stay.
Compensation of CO2 emissions while traveling
We suggest that every participant plant one or more trees to compensate for the environmental damage caused by our travels. We will do that together in the future forest garden at our location. The calculation of upsetting for example a one way flight of 2.000 km is planting 2 trees and caring for it during the next 50 years! (Room for discussion). If you like to donate a tree, please do so by offering 10 € to 20 €.
Clothes and climate
Please bring some protective rain clothes, good shoes and jackets for the evenings. During the months of June the average temperature in Brandenburg ranges between 15 and 25 degrees, with a 50% chance of rainy days during the month.
Activities during your stay
We worked out a combination of activities for learning, working and living together. On a weekly basis we will split up in three to four groups for the activities. We also like to conduct short daily and in depth weekly reviews about your perceptions, feelings, thoughts and wishes about the program, participants and hosting. It is a social experiment of intercultural working, learning and living together. Details will be shared during the first day of the activity.
Sharings and offerings of participants
You are welcome to offer your knowledge, talents and ideas to the group during the afternoons or evenings. Please post them on the board in the community house and give a short explanation to the group. The offerings can have a duration of a few moments to two hours. It can be sharing your knowledge and experience (BA, Master Thesis, projects) or music, dancing, games, entrepreneurship ideas, social experiments and so forth. We also have some board games, table tennis, kicker, and music instruments for your use.
Housekeeping
We like to establish a daily routine of housekeeping to clean up the public spaces of showers, toilets, floors and community houses. Please join one group and help keeping a nice environment for all of us.
Weekend activities
Feel free to do an excursion during the weekend. There are some bicycles which can be used.
When going to Berlin, be aware that there are only limited train and bus services during the weekend. You can purchase group day tickets at reduced prices.
Following a graphical overview of the activities. The first and last week will have a different schedule. A public presentation of the results of the pop up village will be done during the last days of the activities.
