Just outside Santo Domingo rain filtered through limestone for thousands of years, slowly opening caves until the earth fell away and let the light in.
Long before the colonizers arrived, the Taíno came to what is called Tres Ojos to pray. The colonial city that started so much of the extraction across the Americas sits just a couple of miles away. Standing at the edge of the lagoon, under hanging roots, I felt the slow work of water under the hurried assemblage of empire around it. I prayed there as a way of stepping into the next phase of healing from colonization.
I keep coming back to this image. The opening came from patience, from gentle pressure applied over centuries, until what was sealed off could finally breathe.
Today is almost three months into a global journey with my two kids and my wife. My days are split between being a dad on the road and building Blueprint, a labor of love I have stewarded during the last four years.
As I reflect on my time so far, I decided to open up this space with three intentions:
To learn from the models I encounter along the way, and to write them down before the lessons fade from my memory bank
To share what we are doing as a family, so other families wondering whether that is possible can see one real version of it
To translate what I see on the ground for people dedicated to moving the field of philanthropic investing. Many of the answers our field is looking for already exists in places traditional philanthropy rarely reaches
Quisqueya: collecting the stories first
Our first two months were across Quisqueya, the island also known as Haiti. We went as a family to collect ancestral stories from relatives, from elders, from the land itself, in the places our people come from. My father passed away over a decade ago, and now as a father myself the trip became a way to continue my relationship with him across the ancestral planes and connect my kids to his memory (may it continue being a blessing).
The journey also laid the groundwork for a larger project: a rematriation fund on the island. By rematriation I mean returning land, resources, and decision-making to the communities and lineages they were taken away from as a form of repair. Rematriation is a return to the original mother: to the land, and to the women who have always held it. On Quisqueya, Taíno lineages pass through women. So this fund’s decision rests with the matriarchs of the communities it serves. My role is to listen, and to help the money find its way home. More to come on this!
Barichara: how bioregional finance works on the ground
Right now, we are based in the town of Barichara in Colombia. Our kids are in a nature program run out of a local community hub that grew out of Fundacíon Barichara Regenerativa. Local growers bring their produce to the center, and sell products like dried hibiscus, artisinal sweets, and vegan cheeses at the community shop.
I’m learning how bioregional finance actually works here from the community-led funds, the producers’ network, and how links to larger networks like the Earth Regeneration Fund actually work.
The questions I’m carrying around town are:
Where does the first money come from, and who decides where it goes?
What does patient capital mean to a grower and how does it relate to the fund they are connected to?
How do community-led funds and outside capital coexist and where does it break down?
Along the way, I’m finding it really clarifying watching my kids learn in the same place I’m trying to understand. They are learning the land with their hands. I’m learning it through how money flows.
For Families, and for Practitioners
To the families. People keep asking how we do this. The honest answer: we picked self-directed education and nature-based learning as our anchor, and let the programs choose the places rather than the other way around. Our kids are learning language, land, and family history by living inside of them.
In the coming posts I want to share the practical side: how we find programs, how we rent from local families, and what it took to get our kids documents in order. If you have been quietly wondering whether your family could do something like this, I hope this helps you say yes.
To the practitioners. I worked at large fintechs and family offices, built community organizations, and sat on grant committees. One pattern keeps showing up: capital designed far away arrives shaped for the place it came from, not the place it lands. The models I’m meeting were built locally first. Money came second and only on the terms the community could hold. I’m excited to bring back what this part of the journey teaches me, and to ask how we fund work like this without distorting it.
How this will work
I’ll publish one post here every week, in public. Each will follow one thread: a model I’ve encountered, a conversation that shifted something, or a lesson from life on the road with my family.
…. and some of what I learn is not ready for a public page. I’ll share those privately with anyone who wants to go deeper. Subscribe, or just reply to this post, and I’ll make sure you get them.
And if you find yourself near Barichara from now until the end of the year, come visit us! There is more than enough room at our table.
With love,
Felipe
Beautiful and informative. I can't wait to see this project in action