Some Recent Email Conversations

In this post I’d like to share snippets from a bunch of recent conversations with colleagues from around the world. So many great insights, themes, questions, and so forth that I couldn’t bare to leave buried in my inbox.

Many thanks for these fine folk giving their permission for me to share.

Hakai Tane (New Zealand)

I recently found myself in an unexpected email interchange with Haikai Tane, who, as shared here, was David Holmgren’s mentor in design process. I was amazed to read Haikai sharing (without any prompting or hint from me about the latest MPS inquiry) that:

Yes eventually the final design can be recorded on paper ~ but only after the plan is implemented and completed in reality ~ as in ecography ~ however getting it right takes years, decades and sometimes longer … This is why ecography records the completed ecosystems for specific sites only when they are finished and proven ~ which is why the ecography method doesn’t work for permaculture which requires the closed system method of pre-design!

Contemplative cognition was documented by Carl Jung and taught by Alan Watts (Berkeley Uni) from his studies of the Dao de Jing.. It involves learning-by-doing experiments and gaming using geospatial simulations with dynamic imagery, sound, and symbolic logic to generate/produce co-evolutionary pathways for specific situations leading to unpredictable and undesignable outcomes … which are so much better than anything the mind can conceive or design.. it works best with communities not individuals

how to is a skill not knowledge, it requires an empowering culture ~ like Dao culture ~ Western cultures have not transcended dualism yet, so they are blocked by their mindsets from comprehending how and when to engage …. Recently in China I engaged with a rural community living beside the Huang He practicing these methods ~ they are essential for empowering their sophisticated farming systems ~ no talking or phones allowed, no paper or pencils employed ~ only dancing, music and skillful leaders showing how ~ and the rest following ~ so intricate and complex!

Yes eventually the final design can be recorded on paper ~ but only after the plan is implemented and completed in reality ~ as in ecography ~ however getting it right takes years, decades and sometimes longer … This is why ecography records the completed ecosystems for specific sites only when they are finished and proven ~ which is why the ecography method doesn’t work for permaculture which requires the closed system method of pre-design!

In giving permission for me to share these (sparkling!) words of his, Haikai asked that I add Laozi’s first line from the Dao de Jing:

the way that can be told in words is not right!

Pippa Buchanan (Austria & Western Australia)

Writes Pippa

Hey Dan, I am so grateful for all of the work that you are putting into this and how it is encouraging me to think and communicate. I came to permaculture from an adult education background and following encouragement from Rowe have ended up working towards permaculture teaching. I was feeling kind of lame about this because my land based experience is limited, but realised that what I can draw on is years of learning design and adult education understandings to try and make permaculture stronger.

I think that one of the things that hinders a more thoughtful, intuitive and emergent design process across the board is how permaculture is taught.

And what learning objectives we are trying to achieve as teachers and how we ‘assess’ the students at the end of a PDC. So I wonder if one part of making permaculture stronger is in better ways of presenting the design exercises and explaining the goals.

Anyway my \}’@% feeling was because I’ll teach a design process module at the January PDC at Fair Harvest in Margaret River, and listening to the podcasts and reading the blog has made me think about how best to explain these ides A LOT.

It is an exciting teaching challenge – especially as the discussion of what good process & design practice is still an emerging and moving discussion.

So how can the idea of design as an ongoing and emergent process be captured and explained well even if at the end of a PDC students still end up producing a series of layered maps based on a hour visit to a site and a shared interview?

I will let you know how I go, but if you have any immediate ideas I would love to hear them!

Have a lovely wrap up to 2017 and an abundant 2018

Replies Dan

Great stuff Pippa – yeah it’s so interesting in that my focus has been okay, let’s forget about how to teach design process well, and focus on what the heck is good design process, in the sense of something worthy of permaculture and able to more authentically serve permaculture’s beautiful ethos and aspiration.

Yet of course it is not a finish-that-and-only-then-think-about-how-to-work-what-is-emerging-into-teaching situation because the teaching of it is an enormous help to its exploration and articulation, not to mention that there is no ‘finish.’ One thing I have found already though is that the shape of the educational experiences I am part of has changed enormously as a result of trying to take a better approach to designing and facilitating them. A simple example is consciously breaking the habit of designing a course by choosing a bunch of cool topics then assembling them :-).

One thing we’ve done with our PDCs is that the design exercise is not only with 100% real clients but we start on day three and then progress it every day so that the participants end up have many hours and many site visits. We of course fall short of the ideal of starting the implementation but it feels an enormous improvement over the tokenistic exercise traditionally tacked onto the end of a PDC which almost necessitates a design process that flies in the face of all I’ve been learning through the MPS inquiries etc etc..

Anyways lovely to hear of what you’re up to and let’s stay in touch and support each other as we explore and learn more!

Replies Pippa

I think that maybe a broader discussion about teaching within MPS is something that has to come down the line. Its been at the edge of your discussions on the podcast, but I think that until you know what good practice is and where it should move towards (the what), it’s difficult to work out how to explain that whether it is in PDC, an advanced design course, or written into a blogpost or book

I’ll see if there’s a chance for our January PDC group to meet with the clients earlier in the week, I know the site visit is currently booked midway in week two

Anyway thank you, I’m looking forward to more MPS over the next year!

Replies Dan some time later

I am wondering what you would think about me including the following excerpt from our chat in an upcoming post sharing some recent private conversations I’ve been having with folk around the world??

Replies Pippa

Sure! If you think the rambling nature of my comment is understandable I‘m happy for it to be included.

Then, a bit later Pippa continues

Hey Dan, thinking about this further – one of the challenges is that so much of the PDC is about teaching a Permaculture / systems worldview and general ways of being for the majority of participants (let me call this “embodied design”, and then there is a layer of teaching about “design as service” in which designers work with clients. Possibly “design as service” the MPB approach gets confused with “design as product” aka just the paper master plan. To a certain extent, actual “design as service” involves facilitating a client to step into the mode of “embodied design” to interpret, implement and design from the design plan product.

So, that effectively is three levels of teaching design process A) embodied design, applied permaculture principles and ethics as daily practice (the everyday paradigm shift) ? working with a design client and an existing (land based) system in order to propose a new version of the system that applies permaculture ethics and principles – aka a “master plan design” C) establishing “design and communication practices” about working with clients (professional, community groups, family members) to justify the design and facilitate others to interpret, establish, maintain and evolve the system that emerges as a result.

Oh yeah, and all that stuff about ecosystems, forest layers, superhero chickens, economic collapse, soil food webs, keyline etc and decision making, social Permaculture, ethical economics which are all required to do design in modes a, b and c.

My guess is that this generally happens in most PDCs to some extent but possibly through the PDC being pretty solid and the types of people attracted to permaculture anyway. (A) has to happen for all students but it often gets overshadowed by the master plan product focus of the final design project.

Dan Replies

Love these insights Pippa and will share them too!

Rutger Spoelstra (Netherlands)

Writes Rutger

On your latest blog post you asked for a diagrammatic summary of my take on sound permaculture design process. I have made a drawing:

It is based on the design web which has been created by Looby Macnamara. See her book People & Permaculture page – for an explanation. If you haven’t got the book…run to the book store, you won’t regret : ) There is also a short explanation here.

What I like about the design web is that is non-linear and it helps you to design a design process for each design you make. There is no formula for a good design process in my point of view. Every process is unique.

Looby’s design web has been created for people-based designs. My version has been created for designing gardens, farms, landscape, buildings, et cetera. It is a project in progress, I’m still working on it.

For now I don’t have time to explain more. I am a slow writer and it is getting late on this side of the planet (Netherlands). But I hope the drawing will explain my ideas. If you have any questions, please let me know.

Replies Dan

Hey thanks Rutger and lovely to hear from you,

Thanks so much for sharing and hey I’d love to share your drawing and some of your writing on making permaculture stronger as part of a guest post in the next month or so if that’s okay with you. I’ve also ordered Looby’s book and sent her an email – will try and get a podcast recording with her I think.

Best,
Dan Palmer

Replies Rutger

Hi Dan,

Thanks for you enthusiastic response. It would be an honor to be part of a guest post.

Would be nice to have a podcast with Looby, she has a lot of interesting thoughts about the design process to share. I have had a conversation with her about it last year at the European permaculture convergence and it was really inspiring to me.

Best,
Rutger

ps. On a side note, did you ever read Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert? She has some very nice observations about the creative process. It is not permaculture and the style and tone of the book are not my favorite, but it is a fascinating read nonetheless.

Replies Dan

Greetings Rutger and great to hear from you,

I have now a copy of Looby’s book and I look forward to reviewing her design web approach (which I agree is great and relevant!) on the blog, though it’s first mention will be via yourself.

I’ll look up Big Magic thanks!

Richard Cleaver (France)

In response to your request for ‘a little reciprocation’ to Part 23, I’ve attached a map of my (limited) understanding of the field-process-model by Jascha Rohr & Sonja Hörster. I know this is not exactly the kind of thing you were asking for but it is a starting point for us. Maybe you could help fill in some gaps?

As mentioned earlier, we are hoping to move to a new property soon and we intend to use the Hybrid or Generative design approach. I’ve attached a satellite image of the acre site (in central France)

All the best,
Richard

Holger Hieronimi (Mexico)

Thanks for this series of deep inquiries into the field of “design process” – be aware, that quite a few PC designers & activists here in Mexico & Latin America, are in a similar process of re-discovering what design is all about – haven´t commented yet on the series, but following with a lot of interest and (if possible) insight your discussions, resonating with many if not most of your discoveries – I´d like to read the series in context…is there a PDF version of the instalments, for printing & better reviewing?

saludos desde México¹

Alexander Olsson (Sweden)

AO: I’ve thought about the permabliz concept and how it could incorporate a generative design process. Any thoughts there?

DP: Re permablitzing I’m not sharing my thoughts until you share yours 🙂

AO: Haha yes, thank you for asking. I see an immediate problem with the whole concept of people rocking up on one day with lots of expectations and limited time. To start the design process while people stand ready with mattocks is a challenge. If the next unfolding step can somehow be clear on the day of the blitz, then that step has to be pretty large for people to feel like they have done something on the day. After that step there would have to be some kind of break then, maybe for a few weeks and for people to come back to implement the next step. Another approach could be to mock-up things with the host/client before the blitz and work through the steps, and then after all that have a blitz where it is all implemented at once. But you’re not going to be able to stop the implementation when new realisations arise, and even if the mock-up sessions are diligent there are so many things that only become obvious when the actual implementation starts. So I’m leaning towards feeling that a hybrid approach might be as far as one can go to bring some of these ideas to the permablitz. What do you think?

Manuel da Gama Higgs Pereira Morgado (Portugal)

Dear Dan Palmer,

It is hard to make an introduction regarding my feelings after reading what you wrote concerning Permaculture other than the description I wrote as title (kindred spirit). Let’s just say David Seamon was absolutely correct to send me here.
I had long conversations about the research I am doing with Seamon and he insisted four times that I should check your work out. I was too busy at the time (a month ago) but am now at absolute awe at what I was missing! Thank you for sharing your views! Indeed, let’s make permaculture stronger! : )

I am an architecture student, an academic like you claim to be. I’m deep within that realm of existence at this point, finishing my Master in Architecture at Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal.

Needless to say, “permaculture” is a word something like 0.01% of the students at this University are aware of the existence of such a concept or of what it could mean as a design approach. That alone made me skeptical when I first started my research about it – years ago now.

I came to Permaculture by accident during a post-graduation in Eco-Architecture. However, I have been interested in Ecology from a very young age. I pursued Urban Ecology, Environmental Design, Eco-Architecture, name it whatever you want, call the approach whatever you like… I know you know exactly what I am talking about.
But only within the hardcore niche of the people who gravitate these “strong-sustainability” and “deep ecology” circles, where Gaia Theory gnostics meet and eco-literacy is culture I heard about the word permaculture for the very first time.
Those are the same circles that lead me to David Seamon, who in turn, directed me to your blog. It was an enlightening and reassuring read, thank you. I wonder if you have this published elsewhere? I would like to know how you would prefer me to quote you and refer to your design methods schematics.

I found this “exclusivity” regarding permaculture to be a problem as I dug deeper on Permaculture I, II, Pathways and Principles Before Sustainability, Gaia’s Garden and more recently Rainwater Harvesting for Dry Climates and Beyond I, II, and III in the near future. I will try to explain why as briefly as I can.

I am an architecture student first and a permacultural wannabe second. However, I have always been a curious spare-time biologist and technology fan… And recently I have become aware that Ecology needs to stop becoming a Science and to become Culture – intersubjective and diverse eco-literacy as the foundations for the new regenerative and symbiotic development paradigm that we wish to give birth to.
I became increasingly convinced, while visiting some permaculture – related initiatives in my country that there was a lot of strong-willed wishful thinking about it and that scared the academic in me at first, to say the least.

I went to read the theory in order to try to understand what the fuss was all about and I was at shock. The design methodology was the most ecologically sophisticated I had ever come across. How was it possible that nobody even knew about it among the architects I go to school with?

I immediately tried to indoctrinate people. I had the first testaments for the new Bible of Sustainability in my hands, I felt at the time. I had to spread the good word. And so I did with some success.

Most people were very impressed with the core concepts and principles to be so well organized within my peers who do -really- care about sustainable designs. What a beautiful societal model they were, so intertwined, complex and coherent. The problem came when I first began investigating case studies – how the Hell could I present -that- as worthy of the attention of such a snob elite of architectural post-modern design? Most designs looked like gardens or rural campsites with a eclectic 70s ring to it.

Still I kept the logic and began applying it to architecture. I found case studies in my homeland that were worthy at least of being discussed in architectural grounds – Aldeia de Tamera, Aldeia das Amoreiras, and Herdade do Freixo do Meio (in Portuguese, “permaculture” is spelled “permacultura”, in case you try to google them to no avail).

I am now doing a project for a big building and rural infra-structure in Alentejo region within the “montado de sobreiro” ecosystem (cork oak forest molded by agricultural and forestry practices dating back centuries – still can’t reveal the project program, but I promise I will do so as soon as I finish my master thesis).
The reason I am telling you all this is because I came to feel the way you do about permaculture when I had this cultural inheritance at hands to deal with. The reason was that even though people at my research and project groups were impressed theoretically about permaculture, they were very skeptical about the final design quality of the case studies I could gather – even the finest ones! (not ecologically – but aesthetically). And that made me wonder… why? What was wrong?
And the answer that came to mind as valid was culture. I am about to say a very bad thing about “permaculturalists” and I confess it might be pedantic of mine to do so, because I never actually took a PDC or got to know a very vast sample of individuals within the permacultural movement. However, one can’t deny that we are often accused of being the contemporary equivalent of hippies – as in we are deluded with dreams of grandure and imbued with an aura of self-righteous epiphany fueled by cannabis, magic mushrooms and ayahuasca.

Therefore, I am aiming in my master thesis to dignify permaculture as a design system worthy of concern and interlocking it theoretically with many other approaches and concerns – mainly cultural ones, but also other ecological approaches worthy of mentioning regarding architecture.

I have become increasingly certain that the problem with permaculture is that it represents an embryonic cultural movement, often underfunded. It relates with many distinct societal models, but it is always deeply ecocentric. But when it comes to culture, that is where it become tricky.

Let’s just say for the sake of the argument that the community to which I am applying the permaculture approaches and ecological design methodologies is -very- strict when it comes to the priority of its way of life and rituals above everything else. How the hell was I supposed to interfer in that with something as encompassing as permaculture? How was I to -offer- it to -clients-?

And that was exactly when everything started to make sense. Sustainability is not an end in itself, nor ecology. We pursue meaning, we value perception and we seek intersubjectivite values, culture. Was permaculture naive enough to believe it had a different DNA from every single cultural movement in Mankind’s history? You are well aware that the answer is No. Permaculture must be holistic.

Permaculture must turn to Art, History and Philosophy. It must learn with its cultural roots. The ones acknowledged and the ones ignored. Ecology as culture is a very long school of thought – even if implicitly, in a number of anthropological senses. Zeitgeist documentary was wrong – science is not the only universally valid form of knowledge, nor the only useful one – for it is also not an end in itself. How could one explain the contemporary spiritual renewal and interfaith agreements intertwining with ecological and environmental movements? This is exactly what brought me to David Seamon’s Phenomenological Ecology and to the “whole” concept of “nameless quality” and the pattern languages that allow us to identify it. Again, I am sure you know what I am talking about.

My point is… permaculture must penetrate academic existing academic circles. You are absolutely right to do so. I am no sensei of Permaculture by far, but you learned from them so you must know what you are doing.

I apologize for the long winded confession… But having access to your rants and personal introductions, I felt in the right and obligation to do so as well.

I’m sorry if I commit any errors… English is not my first language!

Sincerely grateful,
Manuel Higgs Morgado

Note from Dan: I will share my reply and something of our ongoing discussion as a separate post soon.

Jamie McCall (Western Australia)

1. For the record this was a comment, not an email
2. For the record this was a comment, not an email