A permaculture consultant will expand the vision of your design, even if you think that some of its elements are difficult or hardly feasible.

There may be many factors you simply might not be aware of at the outset. Everyone can read a book about spirals in herb gardens, forest gardens or swales, and watch lots of relevant videos on YouTube. And, of course, everyone can go ahead with the farm project on their own.

However, there is a difference between founding a forest garden and founding it in a way that will ensure it fertilises and waters itself, bears fruit, and all of this in a time much shorter than the natural cycle of plant growth and succession. Initially it may look like the yard is overcrowded and the forest garden does not make sense there at all. But after reviewing the issue together, it will be clear that a forest garden is the right way forward.

And this ‘tuning up’ of the farm vision together is extremely important. Creativity is a fruit of interaction (of two people or more).

An experienced permaculture designer knows how to stack plants in space and time, i.e. to bed many plants together and in the right succession; how to utilise edges and use permaculture patterns to position crops and livestock. Frequently, advantageous side effects are produced which an eye untrained in permaculture may not see: a greenhouse warmed by chickens, a greenhouse floating on the pond inducing water circulation, bean plants climbing along corn stalks as trellis. These are just a few hacks that we can use when designing together a garden, a community garden plot, a farm, or a village.

All in all, a broader design vision produces a much more efficient project, and above all ensures that it is structured around a timeline that does not miss any important step (“I could have done it five years ago, when I was founding the garden; I am sorry I didn’t”).

Copyright Leszek Frankiewicz