This booklet explores community co-design as an alternative to procedural participation in planning. Drawing on principles of earth construction and neighbourhood planning, it argues that making space—like building with earth—works best when shaped collectively, valuing local knowledge, shared labour, and lived experience.


What if home was not something given to you, but something you shaped with your hands from the earth beneath your feet?

Community participation in planning is often promised but rarely fully realised. Too often, people are asked to respond only after decisions have already been made. This leaves a gap between planning policy and the everyday lives of those who actually live in these places. This booklet proposes an ethos of community co-design as an alternative to the marginalised role communities currently occupy within contemporary planning processes.

The argument is grounded in the principles of earth construction, where traditional practices such as cob and adobe rely on local materials, shared labour, and embodied knowledge to produce architecture that is both socially inclusive and environmentally responsive. Despite its frequent characterisation as archaic, earth construction is presented here as an effective framework for co-design, enabling communities to actively participate in shaping the environments they inhabit.

Through neighbourhood planning and two contrasting case studies, this booklet explores both the collaborative and resistant forms of participation. Together, these examples show how people often need to reclaim spatial and political agency when formal planning processes fall short.

Ultimately, this booklet argues that planning, like earth construction, works best when shaped by many hands. Trusting local knowledge, promoting inclusivity, and valuing lived experience are essential to creating socially sustainable environments where communities are not merely consulted, but truly involved in making the ground they call home.