Hendersonville, NC · Est. 2026
Reimagining our overlooked and marginal lands as a growing network of ecological, social, and resilient corridors that nourish our communities and habitats.
Our Mission
The Cultivated Commons is a nonprofit conservation land trust working to transform marginal urban and suburban lands into a network of ecological, social, and resilience corridors protected in perpetuity through conservation easements.
We work in the spaces most people walk past: utility corridors, development setbacks, fragmented parcels, and brownfields. Utilizing the principles of permaculture, we restore and cultivate these forgotten lands into commons that the communities can have pride in.
Our model generates genuine, multilayered conservation value — wildlife habitat, species biodiversity, stormwater management, carbon sequestration, food production, and a shared commons.
What We Create
Connecting fragmented habitat across urban and suburban landscapes to support native wildlife movement, pollinator networks, and biodiversity recovery.
Designing and installing swales, berms, and perennial plantings that manage stormwater naturally and helping municipalities meet green infrastructure goals.
Perennial food forests that can help grow fruits and herbs that build resilience in the communities that support these corridors.
The Commons as Infrastructure
A commons isn't just land you protect, it's land people inhabit. Every corridor we restore is designed as a neighborhood amenity: a living path where residents can walk, linger, forage, and connect with one another without getting in a car.
These corridors provide connection to community assets, like greenways, schools, farmers markets, and friends through the existing built environments without expensive infrastructure projects and disruptive construction.
The goal is a network of accessible commons threading through the region, stitching communities back together one overlooked parcel at a time.
How We Work
We partner with landowners, municipalities, and neighborhoods to identify underutilized parcels — setbacks, corridors, and fragments — suitable for transformation.
Using permaculture design principles, we create layered food forest systems engineered to deliver measurable stormwater, habitat, and biodiversity outcomes.
Students, volunteers, and neighbors install the initial infrastructure — building relationships and skills while establishing the ecological foundation.
Conservation easements legally protect restored lands from development — ensuring the ecological and community value created today endures for generations.
Who We Are
Co-Founder & Chief Steward
Joey is an architect, maker, and permaculture designer based in Hendersonville, NC, with a deep commitment to ecological restoration in overlooked urban spaces. Through his decade of work in architecture, he saw an unfinished picture on each project — how will this project integrate into the community and environment at large.
With a background spanning ecological design, community organizing, and conservation strategy, Joey founded The Cultivated Commons to prove that the most transformative land is often the land no one else is looking at and how these lands can become the shared commons that define a community.
Co-Founder & Chief Naturalist
Aweed's bio coming soon.
Get Involved
Whether you're a landowner, a municipal partner, a grant maker, or simply a neighbor who wants to help — we'd love to hear from you.
Thank you for reaching out.
We'll be in touch soon — the commons is growing, one relationship at a time.