Mas d'en GIL Moon Calender

Objective: Reconnecting people to nature
After many years worried about the fact of the distance between the main population of the world and the nature, I was thinking about how could we try to reestablish a natural connection. Living in big cities people forget about how much time a flower needs to bloom, how important it is that it rains - apart from being annoyed by the traffic jam – how important is the sun in summer for the maturation - instead of thinking about the air conditioner in their car and houses.
The moon is for many people is just a round, white spot in the sky, something you can see from a city or from the countryside, you just need to see a piece of the sky in front of your eyes. Thanks to the moon we can create an interest for some people who wants to get closer to all this knowledge, but at least they will watch the moon and I hope they can start feeling closer to the nature than before. Many people are too far away from nature and the consequence is a lack of respect for the nature. Also my intention is trying to give the nature the importance and respect that it deserves in our society.
Design and Size: "a handy-moon calendar"
Regarding the design, we have tried to combine these two aspect: on one hand to be an "easy to read calendar" and on the other hand to be a "handy-moon calendar".
On one hand the idea was to create a calendar easy to understand and to read. The published "moon book calendars", coming from France but nowadays also published in Spanish, and other languages are mainly focused in the "jardiniere" for those who want to have their vegetable gardens. These books have a long tradition in France, almost 50 years, and for those who are not familiar with them it seems very complicate to understand. Some people are afraid whether or not they can understand correctly the way and this calendar really requires that people read and study before starting to be able to read the information they provide. So the objective was to create a moon calendar that could be read or understood in a very easy way, without having a big knowledge about the moon, but as first stage to get into this issue. This is why we have created a simple design, with a clean graphic design that allows you to identify first of all the moon and after some small spots over each day that represent the four elements.
On the other hand, the idea of creating a "handy-moon calendar" was born after many year of carrying the moon calendar in my "hand-bag", in the vineyards, on my trips, in tastings, wherever I was it was always with me. The idea was to be able to have the calendar always with me but in a smaller size than a book, so we designed this size for the wallet or pocket. If people use it, you become more sensitive to this aspect, so the aspect of being something easy to have on was very important.

Ms. Marta Rovira, owner of Mas d’en Gil
The Calendar / some basic theory
Bio-dynamics consider that the nature is based on IMPULSE. So depending on the position of the MOON, PLANETS and CONSTELLATIONS relative to the earth we are going to have a different IMPULSE that Influences the whole system.
According to plants, depending on the impulse it will tell us which part of the plant that is going to develop.
The moon and the sun (rhythm synodic); this is the movement of the moon relative to the earth and the sun. It takes 29.5 days from a full moon to the next full moon.
The moon and the constellations (rhythm sidereal); the constellations are groups of stars that are fixed in the sky. The sun, planets, moon are moving around them; the sun moves very slowly around the constellations, so we almost consider as a fix element (It takes more than thousands of years to move from one constellation to the next one). The planets move around the sun. The movement of the moon relative to the zodiacal constellations is called rhythm sidereal and it takes 27.3 days. During these 27.3 days the moon passes in front of the 12 constellations. This means for example that it takes 27.3 days from the moment that the moon starts passing in front of LEO until next time it starts passing in front of LEO.
(remember the constellations are fixed in the sky )The 12 constellations are in French
POISSON
BELIER
TAUREAU
GEMEAUX
CANCER
LION
VIERGE
BALANCE
SCORPION
SAGITTAIRE
CAPRICORNE
VERSEAU
These 12 constellations can be associated in the 4 elements:
EARTH ( TAUREAU, VIERGE, CAPRICORNE) = ROOT
WATER ( CANCER, POISSON, SCORPION) = LEAVE
AIR ( GEMEAUX, BALANCE, VERSEAU) = FLOWER
FIRE ( BELIER, LION, SAGITAIRE) = FRUIT
Depending on the constellation the part of the plant which is developing
better are the ROOT (=earth), the Leaf(water), the FLOWER (air) or the
Fruit (fire).
Regarding wine tasting, the days that wines are more expressive are the
FLOWER and FRUIT days. On ROOT days wines are more earthy and closed. On
LEAVE days wines show more the vegetal side. My favourite days for tasting are FLOWER days, wines show themselves very elegant in the nose and in the palate.
I invite people to taste wines and after look at the calendar, so they will be able to understand the influence and the difference between the different days. Tasting wine is an intellectual and individual experience, like reading a book. Everyone is going to read a different meaning of the history and will have an individual and unique experience but at the same time it is very interesting to share this experience with others that also read the same book. Sharing will complete the history and will give us more perspective to approach the intention of the author, expressing the terroir.
For additional stories on the same subject please click here.
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