Proven Permacultureest. 2026
Evidence-Based Land Design

Permaculture, with the receipts.

Draw your boundary. Get a plan grounded in your actual terrain, climate and soils — ordered the way P.A. Yeomans ordered land: climate first, soil last.

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— KEYLINE — KEYPOINT RIDGE VALLEY CENTER RIDGE

Schematic after Yeomans — cultivation parallel to the keyline drifts water from valley toward ridge

~5 m Terrain model (US)
8 Permanence layers
USDA Soil survey data
NASA Climate normals
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What "Proven" Means

Three commitments. No compromises.

The permaculture world is full of beautiful Instagram swales failing on unsuitable land. We work the other way.

i.

Permanence-Ordered

Every recommendation is sequenced by Yeomans' Scale of Permanence — climate, land shape, water, access, trees, structures, fences, soil. You cannot move climate. You barely move topography. Soil is the outcome of the other seven layers working correctly. We refuse to skip ahead.

ii.

Cited & Sourced

The method comes from published work — Yeomans' Keyline books and Mollison's Designers' Manual — and the measurements come from public datasets you can check yourself: USGS terrain, NASA climate normals, USDA soil surveys. Every report lists its sources and its limits.

iii.

Failure-Aware

Every published case study includes what went wrong. Every tool recommendation flags the conditions under which it does not apply. Permaculture has a credibility problem because its successes are celebrated and its failures are quietly buried. We do the opposite.

Foundational lineage

Three voices. One discipline.

"Permaculture is a philosophy of working with, rather than against nature; of protracted and thoughtful observation rather than protracted and thoughtless labour."

Bill MollisonCo-originator of permaculture

Plan the land in order of permanence: climate, land shape, water, roads, trees, buildings, fences — and soil last, because living soil is the result of getting the rest right.

P.A. YeomansThe Keyline Scale of Permanence (paraphrased)

Once you have created the right hydrological balance, 70% of the work is done.

Sepp HolzerWater Is Life (video), paraphrased

The Master Sequence

The Keyline Scale of Permanence

Yeomans' eight-layer ordering. Most permanent first, soil last — because soil is what you build by getting the other seven right.

  1. ClimateWhat you can never change
    Can’t be changed — design around it
  2. Land ShapeTopography, slope, aspect, watersheds
    Changed only by major earthworks
  3. WaterDams, channels, keylines, infiltration
    The most permanent thing you can shape
  4. Access & RoadsHow you and equipment move
    Hard to move once built
  5. TreesBelts, orchards, silvopasture, food forest
    Decades to establish
  6. StructuresResidence, outbuildings, infrastructure
    Built to last generations
  7. SubdivisionFences, paddocks, internal lines
    Easy to revise
  8. SoilThe outcome — measure annually
    The outcome — measure it every year

Case study library

Documented. Dated. Disclosed.

We're collecting real projects with real numbers — including what didn't work. The first entries publish once they pass review.

Every entry includes

Baseline & outcome

Soil tests, water data and photos from before the work, re-measured at year 1, 3, 5 and beyond — the same spots, the same methods.

Every entry includes

Money & labour

What it cost, in dollars and hours, and what it returned. Permaculture that can't show its books is just landscaping with a story.

Every entry includes

What failed

The pond that leaked, the trees that died, the swale in the wrong place. Failures are where other landholders learn the most.

How the library works →

The Design Tool

Your land. Measured first.

Trace your boundary and the tool measures slope, drainage, valleys and estimated keypoints, pulls climate and soil data, and returns a phased plan ordered by permanence. Free, no sign-up. Print it and take it into the field.

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