Saturday, November 15, 2008 10am to 4pm

Location: Langara College, room to be announced. 100 West 49th Avenue, Vancouver, BC. Directions

Cost: $85 includes a delicious lunch with local and seasonal goodies

Register: In person or by phone 604-323-5322 with Langara College Continuing Studies. Course code: 70709

Please bring a simple map of the space you’re working with: your home garden or community garden.

Learn more about the practical applications of Permaculture – a design system based on mimicking natural ecosystems. Permaculture offers much for the busy urban gardener who wants to sustainably grow more food in a small space with minimal maintenance time. Students will design their own perennial food systems based on a simple site plan they bring to class.

Schedule for the day:

10-11:30: Introduction to Permaculture – Exploring the (hard to define) concept, its history and ethics.
11:30-12:30 Lunch provided- local, seasonal and delicious!
12:30-2:00 Defining permaculture design principles and discussing examples of their application in day-to-day life.
2-2:15 Break
2:15-3:45: Learn the basics of site assessment and apply them to your own space. Bring a basic site plan of the space you are working that includes a rough sketch of your space, including any permanent structures, cardinal directons and rough dimensions or we can provide one for you.
3:45: Wrap-up including final questions.

Learning Outcomes:
Students will be able to:
* define permaculture and briefly discuss its history and ethics
* articulate permaculture design principles and the basics of site design
* design a low maintenance perennial food system for their own space

Teachers:
Heather Johnstone is the coordinator of the Edible Garden Project on Vancouver’s North Shore (www.ediblegardenproject.com). She has spent years learning with organic farmers on the west coast, and now teaches urban home gardeners to help them grow food. She teaches workshops ranging from Permaculture to cooking to seed saving.

Sheryl Webster is a landscape designer and permaculture teacher who has worked and studied in both Vancouver and San Francisco. She has worked in both the public and private sector as a project manager for various sustainability initiatives focusing on native and edible plants. Her design experience ranges in scale from garden beds to habitat corridors.

This 10 hour class will take place:
Saturday November 1st  12 noon - 5 pm
Sunday November 2nd  10 am - 3 pm

It will be rain or shine, taking place both inside and outside.
Taking place at the Sustainable Living Arts School in Robert’s Creek on the Sunshine Coast: the Heart Gardens.

The cost is $20 per person. Limited to 13 people .
Register and pay in advance to secure your space.

Design is Destiny.

As the seams of the corporate-military world begin to unravel, local organic food production, conscious relating and low impact living become increasingly important. Enhanced by technological toolsets, there is a
vitalfocus on sustainable community development on a bioregional and planetary level.

Permaculture is an emerging approach to designing relationships and landscapes based on the history of agriculture and social organization with its roots in the tribal wisdoms of our deeper past.

This autumn a small group will gather in the fabled elphinstone rainforest for a 10 hr course in permaculture. We will explore introductory level practical permaculture including organic gardening with native plants, sacred food plants of the Coastal First Peoples and dynamic composting strategies. In addition we will focus on permaculture principles, design concepts and mapping strategies. There will be an
exploration of advanced level permaculture including discussion about permaculture education and media in the context of local and global strategies launched from the Heart Gardens.

In effect this will be both a class in learning about permaculture and learning how to teach permaculture, covering a range of interest from introductory to advanced.