We are so excited to announce the first Pocket City Farms Permaculture Design Course in Autumn 2022. We want to empower you with permaculture design skills and connect you to fellow changemakers in your local area.

Our PDC is an 9 week experience from 7 May – 25 June with a mix of weekends, evenings and self-paced at home activities (minimum 3 hours work required per week including inspiring videos and reading material).

We focus on urban design solutions, however the design principles you learn can be applied to larger suburban or broadacre sites. We offer optional extra volunteering sessions where you can get extra hands-on experience. The 9 week program gives you time to absorb and reflect how you can incorporate permaculture ethics and principles into your life and you will complete a permaculture design for a site of your choice.

Our course curriculum is drawn from Mollison/Holmgren/Morrow curriculum and deeply indebted to John Champagne of Brogo Permaculture Gardens PDC curriculum and design methods taught by Elemental Permaculture.

We cover the following topics throughout the schedule:

Week 1 // Sat 7 May // 9:30am – 4:30pm: Introductions: History, opportunities, ethics and principles of permaculture, Zone 0 Eco Homes
Week 2 // Wed 11 May // 6pm – 9pm: Ecological themes in permaculture, patterns in nature, map reading, site analysis and Zone 1 – Home Food Gardens
Week 3 // Wed 18 May // 6pm – 9pm: Water, soils, and earthworks, Zone 2 Orchards & Food Forests
Week 4 // Wed 25 May // 6pm – 9pm: Seeds, plants, forests/trees and climate. Zones 3 and 4
Week 5 // Sat 4 and Sun 5 June // 9pm – 5pm: Field trip to inspiring sites in Sydney and Wollongong, Zone 5
Week 6 // Wed 8 June // 6pm – 9pm: Appropriate technology, designing for disaster, ecovillages
Week 7 // Wed 15 June // 6pm – 9pm: Integrated pest management, living with weeds, aquaculture, animals and wildlife
Week 8 // Wed 22 June // 6pm – 9pm: Design Studio
Week 9 – Social permaculture, right livelihoods, working in permaculture, design presentations and party!

Facilitator

Jacqui Besgrove has over 10 years experience working as a permaculture designer as ¼ of Permablitz the Gong!, through her own private consulting practice Earthrise Permaculture and has experience applying permaculture design principles to social enterprise settings with her work at Green Connect and now as Operations Manager for Pocket City Farms. She is currently the course convenor for Restorative Ecologies: Permaculture Principles and Practice as part of the UNSW Master of Environmental Management program and is an MEM graduate herself. Jacqui is passionate about urban solutions and promoting permaculture principles and practice within our cities and suburbs to increase resilience and show how much fun radical downshifting can be.

Jacqui will be joined throughout the course by a range of exciting, external guest speakers.

Course Fees

Total price: $1,800

Option to pay $450 deposit and then remaining $1,350 one month prior to course commencing.
Payment plans are available on request // limited spaces available.
Lunch included for Saturdays and dinner included for Wednesday evenings.