Enjoy fast, FREE delivery, exclusive deals and award-winning movies & TV shows with Prime
Try Prime and start saving today with Fast, FREE Delivery

List Price: $24.95 Details

Save: $4.65 (19%)

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns

FREE delivery Saturday, May 27 on orders shipped by Amazon over $25

Or fastest delivery Friday, May 26. Order within 2 hrs 41 mins

Select delivery location

Only 13 left in stock (more on the way)

[{"displayPrice":"$20.30","priceAmount":20.30,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"20","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"30","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"Pkg08E6IpRu5Mzfz%2FB795wDpBUJi%2FXGScl%2F9ITvOK%2BZNpelGhzctpCEB8u6KlYt0xtNLM9eG%2Fd7p6Lloxw3hkxAdRGfUQZaEkEkeMHnrciBlauHZNK0eTXou5pcxWdDTcWoLojHoTjM%3D","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"NEW"},{"displayPrice":"$11.67","priceAmount":11.67,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"11","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"67","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"Pkg08E6IpRu5Mzfz%2FB795wDpBUJi%2FXGSgSVNhMXaHyY2YIxG2sruy2bLn6xzDDOl%2BkeE1oQfBmC0Mkqb6kYGSAODeKhUJ3THW7PPnUoj%2Bzv0D5GpcAx28GwJZXPnq8EKj6obM6cNW6pD1wI15QTZqPEef8VOpw0deOG5LHYpp62a9WN%2FVyfPZMZXIb9N%2FZyr","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"USED"}]

$$20.30 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details

Payment

Secure transaction

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Returns

Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt

Details

Payment

Secure transaction

We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Returns

Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt

This item can be returned in its original condition for a full refund or replacement within 30 days of receipt.

Read full return policy

Add a gift receipt for easy returns

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime

FREE delivery Tuesday, May 30 on orders shipped by Amazon over $25

Or fastest delivery Thursday, May 25. Order within 2 hrs 41 mins

Select delivery location

Used: Acceptable | Details

Sold by Plus The Angel's

Fulfilled by Amazon

Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.

Have one to sell?

Sell on Amazon

Other Sellers on Amazon

Added

Not added

$18.47
+ $3.99 shipping

Sold by: SuperBookDeals---

Added

Not added

$22.07
+ $3.99 shipping

Sold by: Prime Deals, USA

Flip to back Flip to front

Listen Playing... Paused You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.
Learn more

See all 3 images

Follow the Author

Alan Weisman

Gaviotas: A Village to Reinvent the World, 2nd Edition Paperback – Illustrated, September 3, 2008

by Alan Weisman (Author)

4.6 124 ratings

See all formats and editions

Price

New from

Used from

Kindle

"Please retry"

$12.99

—

Hardcover

"Please retry"

$16.99

$12.30

$1.35

Paperback, Illustrated

"Please retry"

$20.30

$15.12

$1.65

Kindle
$12.99 Read with Our Free App
Hardcover
$8.06 - $16.99

71 Used from $1.35 6 New from $12.30 7 Collectible from $10.95
Paperback
$20.30

54 Used from $1.65 15 New from $15.12

Purchase options and add-ons

Los Llanos―the rain-leached, eastern savannas of war-ravaged Colombia―are among the most brutal environments on Earth and an unlikely setting for one of the most hopeful environmental stories ever told.

Here, in the late 1960s, a young Colombian development worker named Paolo Lugari wondered if the nearly uninhabited, infertile llanos could be made livable for his country’s growing population. He had no idea that nearly four decades later, his experiment would be one of the world’s most celebrated examples of sustainable living: a permanent village called Gaviotas.

In the absence of infrastructure, the first Gaviotans invented wind turbines to convert mild breezes into energy, hand pumps capable of tapping deep sources of water, and solar collectors efficient enough to heat and even sterilize drinking water under perennially cloudy llano skies. Over time, the Gaviotans’ experimentation has even restored an ecosystem: in the shelter of two million Caribbean pines planted as a source of renewable commercial resin, a primordial rain forest that once covered the llanos is unexpectedly reestablishing itself.

Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez has called Paolo Lugari “Inventor of the World.” Lugari himself has said that Gaviotas is not a utopia: “Utopia literally means ‘no place.’ We call Gaviotas a topia, because it’s real.”

Relive their story with this special 10th-anniversary edition of Gaviotas, complete with a new afterword by the author describing how Gaviotas has survived and progressed over the past decade.

Print length

256 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Chelsea Green Publishing
Publication date

September 3, 2008
Dimensions

6 x 1 x 9 inches
ISBN-10

1603580565
ISBN-13

978-1603580564
See all details

Bought Together

Frequently bought together

Gaviotas: A Village to Reinvent the World, 2nd Edition

$20.30

Only 13 left in stock (more on the way).

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

+

$11.69

Get it as soon as Saturday, May 27

In Stock.

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

+

Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants

$13.25

Get it as soon as Saturday, May 27

In Stock.

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

Total price:

To see our price, add these items to your cart.

Try again!

Details

Added to Cart

Some of these items ship sooner than the others.

Show details Hide details

Choose items to buy together.

Most purchased | Highest rated | Lowest Pricein this set of products
Daniel Quinn
6,250
Paperback
$11.69
This item:
Alan Weisman
124
Paperback
$20.30
Edward C. Wolf
2
Paperback
$28.98
Alan Weisman
1,965
Paperback
$19.09

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...a book telling a tale too lovely for fiction, a lyrical, well-observed book that reports from the llanos of eastern Colombia, savannas tortured by guns and cows and cocaine, of an experiment in solar democracy in which 'appropriate technology' is anything but a sad product on the discount tables of broken, post-sixties idealism."--Tom Athanasiou, The Nation (This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title)

Review

Library Journal-
In the early 1970s, a unique community was founded in the los llanos region of Colombia. Located north of the Amazon rain forest, this region is an expansive savannah, sparsely populated and generally considered uninhabitable. Gaviotas originated out of the belief that the current state of urban expansion and poverty and the continued depletion of natural nonrenewable resources could not be sustained and that the future required people to learn how to live in harsh, inhospitable environments and to do so in an ecologically sound and sustainable manner. Journalist Weisman tells the story of a remarkable and diverse group of individuals (engineers, biologists, botanists, agriculturists, sociologists, musicians, artists, doctors, teachers, and students) who helped the village evolve into a very real, socially viable, and self-sufficient community for the future. The people of Gaviotas today produce innovative technologies (solar collectors, irrigation systems, windmills, and hydroponic gardens) that use the environment without depleting or destroying it. While some of their creative endeavors have not succeeded, even the failures tend to spawn ideas for future successes. Weisman does a fine job of detailing Gaviotas's evolution and placing it within the larger global historical context. The story he presents is wonderful testament to human creativity, commitment, and effort toward building a socially viable and environmentally sustainable future. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

-- Karen Collamore Sullivan

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Chelsea Green Publishing; 10th anniversary edition (September 3, 2008)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 256 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1603580565
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1603580564
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 12.8 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 1 x 9 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #671,275 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #19 in Wind Energy
- #44 in Colombian History
- #47 in Colombia Travel Guides

Customer Reviews:
4.6 124 ratings

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Videos

Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video!

Upload your video

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Alan Weisman

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Author of the critically acclaimed New

York Times best seller The World

Without Us, Alan Weisman is an

award-winning journalist whose reports

have appeared in HarperÄôs, the New

York Times Magazine, Atlantic Monthly,

Discover, and Orion, among others,

and on National Public Radio. A former

contributing editor to the Los Angeles

Times Magazine, he is a senior radio

producer for Homelands Productions

and teaches international journalism at

the University of Arizona. He lives in

western Massachusetts.

Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5

124 global ratings

5 star		75%
4 star		18%
3 star		2%
2 star		1%
1 star		4%

How customer reviews and ratings work

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Geranium

A book for reflection

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 16, 2022

Verified Purchase

I read this book years ago. It really moved me and seemed like a hopeful idea for decentralization. I just now got it for a gift for a young friend who is interested in sustainability.

Helpful

Loyal Prime Customer

An experiment that's changing lives continues to inspire hope for the planet.

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 3, 2019

Verified Purchase

If you've never read this book and Trump's vicious and ignorant lack of respect for our country's environmental policies and practices has destroyed your hope for the earth's future, just read it. There are few wiser or more hopeful books about what we could be doing to live sustainably. This book is not at all the preachy, chatty lists of statistics and handy tips of how to live without using plastic bags that strive to inspire us to face the inconvenient truths about this planet. Instead, it is an inspiring story that happened and continues to happen and in an unlikely place for it to happen. One of the lessons of how environmental and economy interact is that environmental quality becomes a low priority when you live at a subsistence level. Yet this miracle happens in a desolate area blighted by poverty's desperation. Read about what can happen and think about what we can change.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Kindle Customer

Utopia? No. Topia? Yes.

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 10, 2000

Verified Purchase

In 1966, when he was 22, Paolo Lugari and his brother drove over barely passable roads to a desolate area 200 miles east of Bogota, Columbia. The llanos area is a poor-soil barren that grows only a few nutrient-deficient grasses, a vast expanse of sun-baked plains in spite of over 100 inches of rain per year. A place of deadly water and hungry mosquitos. Conditions were so daunting that the Columbian government abandoned an attempt to build a road through the area. Lugari saw an opportunity to create something very special. And he did it. Today Gaviotas is a thriving, sustainable community of hundreds of joyous people studying, inventing, producing, singing and dancing amidst a huge forest that they planted. Residents from all walks of life have designed and built, planted and harvested, birthed, nurtured, taught, and entertained. There are teeter-totters that operate super-efficient pumps to bring water to the school, solar heat to cook meals, solar kettles to sterilize drinking water, ultra-light windmills to provide power. The hospital has been designated one of the 40 most important buildings in the world. Some have called Gaviotas a utopia. Lugari insists that, "Utopia literally means no place. We call Gaviotas a topia because it's real." Gaviotas the village is surprising, uplifting, extraordinary. Gaviotas the nonfiction book is as compelling as a novel, as educational as a textbook, as inspirational as the biography of a great person. If you need to rise early, do not take this book to bed with you.

18 people found this helpful

Helpful

Zachrey Helmberger

A book filled with hope

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 16, 1998

Verified Purchase

When Jessie Jackson refrains, "Keep hope alive! Keep hope alive!" we were with him, but I, for one, was left wondering where this hope was. Alan Weisman's "Gaviotas", a chronicle of the Colombian village Gaviotas, is the real McCoy in black and white. Over and over again, "Gaviotas" details the hope-filling victories towards a smarter, more harmonious way of living with simple, clever, appropriate technology leading the way.
"Gaviotas" talks about the power of creative thought sharply focussed on simple, appropriate technology for totally ignored boonies of the Colombia's tropical plains. It talks about the creation of an extremely dedicated community out of an infertile, barren plains in the middle of war-torn Colombia. It talks about the seemingly miraculous transformation of grassland into rainforest and the tireless dedication of it's creators. It talks about the power of community, networking and partnerships with universities.
I was, however, disappointed by the relative lack of contact people, organizations, and publishings for people interested in creating their own community. The story of the Gaviotas community is so inspiring it deserves a newsgroup of its own on the internet!
Being an engineer by trade, I was left brimming with questions. How did they come up with the process for ultra-black copper sheeting? Where can I get the six films about Gaviotas made by Pepe Gomez? How can a roof focus and reflect heat away from a building? Can a Gaviotas be created here in the U.S. or is life too easy here?
"Gaviotas" is beautifully written; a real turner. I had to tear myself away from it each night so I could get to work on time in the morning and had dreams of creating my own Gaviotas in the U.S.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Mary Berry

Amazing, read this if you want to know how to create a sustainable future

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on June 15, 2011

Verified Purchase

Amazing.
Uplifting.
Inspiring.
Practical.
Read this is you want to know how we can create a sustainable future/less fossil fuel consumption.

*After reading this, about how people living in a "third world country" could create and implement energy efficient technologies, I became very frustrated that the United States did not have the foresight to utilize the same technologies in the 1980's when it would have helped to reduce the coming energy crisis of the next 200 years/end of the industrial age.

The technologies/lifestyle created by the people of Gaviotas serves as a beautiful example of ways to soften our fall from extravagant energy consumption ---> sustainable society.

People have the power, don't let consumer culture steal your creativity. We really do have the brain power (as individuals, don't rely on the federal government for too much) to create a world in which we can live comfortably and happily without relying on the rampant energy usage that we have only gotten accustomed to in the past 100 years.

If you enjoy this book (and I think you will), you may also enjoy:
The World Without Us
Small is Possible: Life in a Local Economy
The Long Descent: A User's Guide to the End of the Industrial Age
and maybe this one if you're interested in communes/community:
A Walden Two Experiment; The First Five Years of Twin Oaks Community.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Translate all reviews to English

Antony R. Macer

Less concerned about human kind, having read this book.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on December 8, 2019

Verified Purchase

I have read only the first edition not the one shown on the advertisement on this page. However, by reading this book I have been shown how some human beings in recent time can work themselves into a mode of life together that is sustainable, creative and and peacemaking, even under difficult conditions local to them.
Highly recommended to all who have given up attempting to find such inspiration.
The author's style may seem overtly positive, but understand the facts recorded, and that will lead you to accommodate it.

HB Shopper

Good read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on July 9, 2016

Verified Purchase

Purchased for a friend who loved it.

Emmanuel Baeten

Une merveilleuse aventure, porteuse d'espoir

Reviewed in France 🇫🇷 on March 12, 2014

Verified Purchase

J'ai trouvé ce livre très passionnant et bien écrit. L'auteur retrace une vingtaine d'année de recherches en science appliquée et en expérimentation sociale. Le projet est toujours actuel, les menaces sans cesse renouvelée, les réponses que les habitants de Las Gaviotas y apportent toujours innovants: pragmatiques et durables.
Le livre reste donc très actuel !

Translate review to English

See all reviews

Amazon Music Stream millions of songs	Amazon Advertising Find, attract, and engage customers	6pm Score deals on fashion brands	AbeBooks Books, art & collectibles	ACX Audiobook Publishing Made Easy	Sell on Amazon Start a Selling Account

Amazon Business Everything For Your Business	Amazon Fresh Groceries & More Right To Your Door	AmazonGlobal Ship Orders Internationally	Home Services Experienced Pros Happiness Guarantee	Amazon Ignite Sell your original Digital Educational Resources	Amazon Web Services Scalable Cloud Computing Services

Audible Listen to Books & Original Audio Performances	Book Depository Books With Free Delivery Worldwide	Box Office Mojo Find Movie Box Office Data	ComiXology Thousands of Digital Comics	DPReview Digital Photography	Fabric Sewing, Quilting & Knitting

Goodreads Book reviews & recommendations	IMDb Movies, TV & Celebrities	IMDbPro Get Info Entertainment Professionals Need	Kindle Direct Publishing Indie Digital & Print Publishing Made Easy	Amazon Photos Unlimited Photo Storage Free With Prime	Prime Video Direct Video Distribution Made Easy

Shopbop Designer Fashion Brands	Amazon Warehouse Great Deals on Quality Used Products	Whole Foods Market America’s Healthiest Grocery Store	Woot! Deals and Shenanigans	Zappos Shoes & Clothing	Ring Smart Home Security Systems

eero WiFi Stream 4K Video in Every Room	Blink Smart Security for Every Home	Neighbors App Real-Time Crime & Safety Alerts	Amazon Subscription Boxes Top subscription boxes – right to your door	PillPack Pharmacy Simplified	Amazon Renewed Like-new products you can trust