Permaculture consultation

Are you interested in a property in Portugal and want to consult someone who can look at it with the permaculture eye?

Are you dreaming to make a transition into a more sustainable, conscious lifestyle and need practical tips?

Would you like to produce your own food, but you’re not sure where to start from?

We are happy to help with that and many other issues during the permaculture consultations. During this time we focus entirely on your individual situation, your goals, visions, resources and limiting factors. Gathering all that and relying on our personal experience, some achievements as well as mistakes, we can guide you trough the process, regardless where you are on your journey.

We offer online consultations for anyone, who is too far to meet us in person. We are happy to advice you and share our experience here in Portugal. However online framework will have certain limitations, since we can’t really be on your site and know your own microclimate that well. We also don’t offer a further design in case we can’t visit the place. The online consultation is ideal for people who are in the process of moving to Portugal or  planning to do so, or for those who live too far to make the on site consultation reasonable.

If you live in our area of Central Portugal, we are happy to visit you on your site. We can also establish regular consultations suited to your needs, as you grow into new tasks and challenges of your project. Or refer to other people from the local network, who can help you to maintain it. If there is a need for it, we can develop a permaculture design for your plot, garden, balcony or a house, tailor it to your exact needs and visions.

The duration of the first consultation always vary considering the personal circumstances between 1-3 hours.

While most of us think of permaculture as an efficient and organic way to garden, for some it will become an entire lifestyle. But there is the tendency to forget that first of all it is all about the design… By the way, I really love the multitude of ways to define permaculture! As in the healthy ecosystem, each different perspective contributes to the diversity. If you need more basic explanations, here we explain the topic of permaculture a bit more into detail.

So what is this design? I’ve decided that instead of serving here a long complicated definition full of smart words, I will point out few things about permaculture design that stand out:

• It follows its ethics and principles. That’s so crucial and important. In fact it is exactly what makes permaculture so different from any other methodologies or movements.
• It’s based on a holistic and systems thinking approach. The elements of the living systems are connected in so many ways and levels, that only careful observation and interaction with them allows us to understand them deeply. Unlike constructing a machine, when we work with natural elements, the most important are the connections between the elements – not elements itself.
• Works with nature rather than against it. This is why we will never find two same permaculture designs. Even though it sounds tempting to just replicate a system that already works well (think of all the supermarkets and restaurant chains). When we work with nature, we take into account its unique and complex situation, patterns, history, sectors etc. We also interact with the design as being part of it, not just creating something separate from us.
• Creates abundance, not scarcity. When we create a place, a garden, a home or even a business plan with permaculture ethics in mind, we think about how we can connect to our surroundings. How can we positively interact to contribute to the abundance without the fear of not getting enough out of it. That is very different to the competitive attitude that most of us are used to. It takes a lot of courage and motivation to make that shift, but the results are really stunning.

If you’re curious for more technical info, that’s a great article to explore:

Permaculture Design in 5 Steps