Salmon
Creek
Arts
Come to Salmon Creek...
- SCHOOL: apply by March 4th for Schools of Salmon Creek, Sep 1 to Oct 26. Now *FREE*!
- RENTALS: one or two week stays through April 5th and mostly monthly stays from June 2026 onward.
- EMAIL office(at)salmoncreekarts(dot)org.
Salmon Creek Arts runs the year round arts community at Salmon Creek Farm, a sanctuary of precious riparian and coast redwood habitat on Central Pomo land established as a counterculture commune in 1971, now a long term living art project shaped by many hands.
We cultivate expanding communities of artists, each coming with something to offer the commune, learning from each other and the land. There is time to slow down, space to take a step back, the chance to live close to the land, to participate in its cycles, dwelling in modest hand-crafted spaces within a communal free-range wild wooded environment.
Our central program Schools of Salmon Creek is a free two month land-based student-run school focused on the living arts related to body, craft, food, land, shelter, and stewardship.
Salmon Creek Farm is located on 33 acres of second and third growth redwoods two miles from California’s Mendocino Coast. Old logging roads and foot trails criss-cross south facing slopes from sunny meadows, gardens, orchards, communal outdoor kitchen, and dance deck on top, to eight original commune cabins each nestled in their own nook of the terrain, across a ravine that bisects the land to abandoned off-grid cabins, and finally down to Big Salmon Creek in the valley. It is an especially good spot to feel your small place in the big cycles of life on earth.
Salmon Creek Farm has been informally offering arts programs in a similar spirit since 2014, and now as an independent self-sustaining 501(c)3 non-profit organization, SCA takes over year-round operations - and eventually ownership - of Salmon Creek Farm.
Check out the Salmon Creek Collection at Heath Ceramics with a portion of the proceeds go to Salmon Creek Arts.
Check out the Salmon Creek Collection at Heath Ceramics with a portion of the proceeds go to Salmon Creek Arts.
Salmon Creek
Community
Rentals 🔔
Salmon Creek Farm was established as a commune in 1971 by a group of young visionaries seeking other ways of living during turbulent times. Now in the hands of Salmon Creek Arts, we offer weekly or monthly cabin stays between our workshop and school programs. This private sanctuary space offers a daily life close to the land as a part of our wider community on the stunning Mendocino Coast. There is the possibility for both deep solitude - in private handcrafted iconic cozy cabins nestled among the coastal redwoods - and engagement with others sharing the land, often leading to long term connections, and to our ever expanding circles out in the world. Read through to the end before requesting to schedule stays by the MONTH (at Rainbow, Moonlight, Walden, River, & Salmon cabins) or the WEEK (at Cedar).
Come with an intention for how you want to ‘spend’ your time, perhaps to take a step back for some critical distance from your daily life, a chance to create something new, a tranquil place to work remotely, or even a pause from projects and productivity altogether.
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Cabins are reached by foot trails across 33 acres of south-facing coastal redwoods. Each occupies a unique secluded nook in our south-facing wooded slope. They were lovingly built, rebuilt, repaired, furnished, and embellished by many hands over the years with scavenged local materials.
Once on the land we put everyone on a whatsapp party line to be directly in touch with each other, to announce meals, invite each other over, ask for help with something, organize an event, say “hey I’m going to town if anyone needs anything,” etc.
The communal kitchen, dining room, and lounge at Dawn cabin are available for community use from 11am to 9pm daily. Monthly residents also have full use of the vegetable gardens and fruit orchard while contributing 2 hrs/wk to commune life: stocking pantry, tending compost, weeding gardens, orienting new guests, or chopping firewood.
The communal kitchen, dining room, and lounge at Dawn cabin are available for community use from 11am to 9pm daily. Monthly residents also have full use of the vegetable gardens and fruit orchard while contributing 2 hrs/wk to commune life: stocking pantry, tending compost, weeding gardens, orienting new guests, or chopping firewood.
- You'll need a car to reach us and for the duration of your stay.
- Accessibility issues with all cabins, remote from cars and reached on foot.
- Cabins have fast wifi, kitchenettes, outdoor showers, outhouses, bedding, and wood stove heat (Sep-May only).
- Open for communal use: Dance Deck, Outdoor Kitchen, & trail to Salmon Creek.
- Private kitchenettes have small fridge, sink, all utensils, drip/french coffee makers and grinder, and cook stove (most without oven). Meals not included.
- No guests or drop-in visitors. Partners may visit for any amount of time.
- Guests pack out their own refuse and prepare beds for next guests.
WEEKLY
- Arrivals exclusively Mondays 3-6pm (1:30-4:30pm Oct-Feb).
- Departures by 11am Sundays.
- Cedar cabin only from June 2026: Solo, couple, or 2 friends in 2 beds at $1900/wk.
Other weekly rates** through March: Solo at Salmon at $1000 / Solo or couple at Moonlight, Walden or River at $1200 / Solo or couple at Rainbow at $1750 / Up to 3 in 3 beds at Dawn at $2500.
MONTHLY
- Arrivals exclusively on the 1st of the month from noon to 6pm.
- Departures before noon on the last day of the month.
Rates**
** Full payment to book (or first and last month for 3 month stays). Non-transferable. Monthly: Non-refundable. Weekly: Cancel with full refund within 48 hours. 50% refund up to 8 weeks before arrival and none thereafter. Reschedule within the season if alternate date/cabin available up to 8 weeks before arrival for 15% fee. Inquiry form includes opportunity to either request or donate to a fund for residents of historically marginalized communities (especially BIPOC).
These rentals are a critical source of support for Salmon Creek Arts, work-trade arrangements are not available. Email office (at) salmoncreekarts (dot) org any time.
SCHOOLS
of Salmon
Creek 🎏
The 2026 session is *FREE* September 1st to October 26th. Apply by March 4th. Application fee increases end of day (midnight PST) Sat, Jan 31st.
Schools of Salmon Creek is an annual land-based student-run free school for artists *of all kinds* at Salmon Creek Farm. We carry on the legacy of the original counter-culture commune to this next chapter on the land by considering abundance, care-taking, climate, community, ecology, embodiment, habitat, inter-dependence, mystery, resilience, resourcefulness, self-sufficiency, sensuality, shelter, sustenance, and stewardship; getting off screens and out of doors; where the teachers are the land and each other.
For artists seeking a deeper connection to the natural world as a context for their work while engaging with other artists - we offer time, space, community, and the opportunity to participate in the daily life of the Salmon Creek Farm sanctuary on the Mendocino Coast. It is a good place to step away from daily routines and surrender to the cycles of life close to the land as part of an improvised artist community.
This is a space for active engagement, with the land and each other, not a residency to bring work in process, nor a conventional school where artists produce work alone in a studio. There are no typical indoor facilities or production spaces, just a desk in your private cabin, the triangle Dance Deck, the Outdoor Kitchen, the orchards & gardens, the riparian valley of Salmon Creek, and 33 acres of coast redwoods.
How can we awaken all of our senses and be attentive artists in the world today?
For artists seeking a deeper connection to the natural world as a context for their work while engaging with other artists - we offer time, space, community, and the opportunity to participate in the daily life of the Salmon Creek Farm sanctuary on the Mendocino Coast. It is a good place to step away from daily routines and surrender to the cycles of life close to the land as part of an improvised artist community.
This is a space for active engagement, with the land and each other, not a residency to bring work in process, nor a conventional school where artists produce work alone in a studio. There are no typical indoor facilities or production spaces, just a desk in your private cabin, the triangle Dance Deck, the Outdoor Kitchen, the orchards & gardens, the riparian valley of Salmon Creek, and 33 acres of coast redwoods.
How can we awaken all of our senses and be attentive artists in the world today?
In some ways, you’re just another creature on the land, as soon as you arrive and as long as you stay, in communion with other creatures and the past and future humans: warmed by wood from the land that those before you may have chopped, sowing a garden and tending an orchard that may feed those coming after you, using water from the spring, contributing to the richness of the soil with your compost, while honoring and learning from indigenous knowledge.
It is a unique chance to expand your art practice while cultivating fundamental life and survival skills - that can provide a sense of agency and security to the precarious life of an artist - and who knows, they might even find their way into your art practice some day. Come with an open mind, the willingness to improvise, a spirit of generosity, the capacity to respond to the environment in adaptive ways, and a sense of adventure.
