Imprinted Beauty
Aesthetic: a branch of philosophy dealing with
the nature of beauty, art, and with the creation and appreciation of beauty.
(ref:Merriam-Webster)
Since the advanced permaculture design process, or any
design process, is influenced by the designer’s personal values, we need to
assess our aesthetic defaults. We need to critically examine and reevaluate why
we act the way we do and how decisions and choices are made. We see more with
our eyes through the aesthetic filter of our culture than through our innate
organic vision. We appreciate great beauty in the natural world that we
do not incorporate in our controlled living space because we have learned a
separation between that world and our personal space defines us as “superior or
civilized”. How we perceive beauty, which is the
learned cultural aesthetic, conflicts and causes stress in the permaculture
design process. In serious ecological design, I believe, we need to redirect
our vision to the functional aesthetic of natural systems. In the design
process we must follow all the steps in the scale of permanence and apply our
design process in a manner that redefines our personal aesthetic to a more
natural expectation. Using a structure of decision-making, from large-scale
patterns to details as they are justified does this. Following an organic
design process allows us to discover the design solutions rather than impose
them[i].
In order to do ecological design in a sustainable manner we
follow a functional aesthetic as nature does. What we perceive as beauty
in nature is the functional aesthetic that is the result of billions of choices
as solutions to efficiency and fitness of living organisms. These patterns that repeat in our
vision show us the most efficient use of space, resources, transportation of
resources, and resilience.
Organism fitness is directly related to its ability to thrive in its
niche. Each cell, each genetic mutation either increases or decreases the
fitness of the affected organism. The simplicity of design for the most
efficient use of space, resources, and structural resilience, must also be
sufficient to allow the system to survive changes in a niche, be they as in our
world, climactic, geological, meteorological, or through competition with other
systems.
When we as Permaculture designers begin to read the land, we
want to make sure that we are being imprinted by the land so that our design is
not imprinted (forced) on the land. That is why the assessment process, in
site-assessment, cannot be motivated by extraction of resources. We are only
looking for available resources that we may enhance, restore, and integrate in
a design that will increase the fitness of the land and its ability to buffer
extreme events, which may deplete its resources. Within the boundaries of the
property for which we are making a master plan, we are the new genetic code. We
are like a virus in its most positive sense. We as ecological designers can
supply a “new genetic code”
bringing increased resilience to a property. We can help the land restore
itself to natural fertility. We can assist the land in developing deeper and
richer organic material on its horizon. As stated in many permaculture
articles, we accelerate succession. We must see ourselves as a steward of the
land, not its master. By increasing the ecological services available to
the natural systems we create increased resources for ourselves. We are the primary livestock in
this natural system, yet as the stewards of this land we know that if we were
to vacate the property, the natural systems will be more resilient, deeper in
organic materials, and at a higher state of natural restoration than if we had
never appeared. There will be increased diversity of flora and fauna and
increased levels of complexity in the ecology.
The biggest challenge we have in ecological design is
refraining from imprinting our personal, cultural, and economic aesthetic on
natural systems that already exist. We ourselves
are imprinted by our culture to create personal space that follows the cultural
aesthetic of our origin. It is not hard to imagine the design of a house built
by a consumerist suburban American. It is also not hard to imagine how that
design would change based on the native origin of the designer. That
subconscious design driver, which infiltrates are ecological design, is most
likely contrary to natural ecological design. This is the predetermined
aesthetic that is subtly incorporated in our concepts. As we walk an
undisturbed property, we can see the natural aesthetic of ecological systems,
mostly in what we would call Permaculture zone 5. The natural aesthetic or
beauty is the functional design of natural systems. As we move down the zones
to zone 4, zone 3, zone 2, and zone 1, we can see the cultural design choices
appear and begin to negatively effect ecological services. The greatest
challenge we have is trying to adapt the predetermined economic and cultural
design drivers (defaults) to our goal of a natural design (intention) based on
enhancing ecological services rather than our economic and lifestyle
preferences.
In the SouthWoods Organic Design Process we observe, through
a tour of the built environment, the differences between learned beauty,
cultural defaults, and an appreciation for functional beauty, which appears
when nature’s patterns are valued as the primary guide to beauty.
[i] Meaning,
decisions are based on necessity rather then preference. As will be shown in the course, plant
species are not considered until all other design items have been defined. It
is the last consideration in ecological design.
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