Returning to the Farm
About two years ago my wife and I decided to move back to her family farm with the intention of staying long-term. It is a very beautiful place and its future was somewhat hanging in the balance as her parents are aging and the plans of her and her siblings remained unknown. I was becoming very interested in permaculture and regenerative design and recognized the opportunity to contribute my energies in a way that would benefit everyone. It has also always been a dream of my wife’s to raise children on the land where she grew up. Needless to say her parents where ecstatic to hear our intentions.
Our original goal was to rebuild an old (and quite dilapidated) house on the back of the property, but finally abandoned that plan as the numbers came in for creating access, electricity and security. So we considered our options for building something closer to the main house and after quite a bit of deliberation settled on a location nearby. We looked into pre-fabricated homes and different options as our budget was tight, finally deciding on a more permanent option - to build our house in a more traditional style mostly with adobe (a mixture of clay, sand and straw). Because of time and space constraints, I have decided to leave the details of the house construction for another report.
Design Framework
Aranya’s book presents several possible design frameworks, but the structure of the book itself seems to follow the SADIM model so that is what I have chosen for this project. At the end of each section he created a flowchart that maps out the process in detail. For my own guidance I decided to create these flowcharts as Xmind maps and attempted to follow them very closely in my design. They will play a central visual role for the reader of this output packet. I have included my detailed notes of each step as notes in the mind map that can be downloaded as well in a PDF document than you can scroll through.
Permaculture Design
The house is now in the ‘finishing touches’ stage, and we will be moving in very shortly. Now we can turn our energies toward designing the surrounding area to meet our needs and wants. The area that I am focusing on for this OP is the approximately 2 acres that surround the new house and the adjacent food forest. I have decided to follow very closely the process laid out in the book Permaculture Design: A Step by Step Guide written by Aranya for this design. After reading most of the popular literature on permaculture, I found the detailed processes in this book to be exactly what I needed to guide me through the design process. My basic goal for this design is to create a living environment that provides for our basic needs and promotes wellness while improving my abilities as a permaculture designer.
Pivot
As an aside, I originally planned to do a master plan of the entire farm for this project but decided it would be better to start with a smaller plot. I realized that I do not have the basic design skills or experience to tackle such a big project right now. So a big aim for this design is to acquire those skills and the experience that will prepare me to do the whole farm for what will most likely be my first OP of my second cycle at Gaia U (early 2015). We also have more free reign over this part of the farm to experiment with some techniques, whereas much of the bigger design will have to coincide with the goals of a bigger group of people and will be far more complex to navigate the process. So we’ll start small, focusing on the area around our new house and expand outward.
Goals
- Gain experience with a nuts and bolts permaculture design process
- Develop the land around our new house guided by permaculture principles and techniques
- Create a beautiful, abundant living environment that promotes health and well-being for all inhabitants
- Transform myself in the process - achieve meaningful un/learning and deepen my understanding of what it means to be a designer
- Create evidence of my process and un/learning to share with others, add to the knowledge commons and receive useful feedback