Holmgren principles

Posted on 2026-03-05 11:57 in tools • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with permaculture, Holmgren principles

In addition to the Permaculture Ethics, David Holmgren's list of 12 design principles shows us helpful ways to think about our systems.

  • Observe and interact
  • Catch and store energy
  • Obtain a yield
  • Apply self regulation and accept feedback
  • Use and value renewable resources and services
  • Produce no waste
  • Design from …

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OODA loop

Posted on 2025-04-05 20:12 in tools • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with OODA, permaculture, Holmgren principles

OODA is an abbreviation for the words: Observe, Orient, Decide, Act. Developed and taught by John Boyd, a US military pilot, as a mental model for training other pilots.

Observe is about overseeing the whole, everything, facts and emotions, the different players and their (apparent) motives, culture and history and …


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Permaculture Ethics and Principles

Posted on 2023-05-05 15:17 in tools • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with permaculture, ethics, Holmgren principles, attitudinal principles

Ethics

  • Earth care
  • People care
  • Fair share / Future care

To consider for Earth Care and Future Care:

  • Refuse
  • Rethink
  • Reduce
  • Reuse
  • Repair
  • Repurpose
  • Recycle
  • Recover

Attitudinal principles

  • Multiple elements x multiple functions
  • Everything gardens
  • The problem is the solution
  • Yield is theoretically unlimited
  • Work with nature
  • Minimum effort, maximum effect …

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Facilitation: Design: Healer's Practice

Posted on 2021-07-20 16:12 in designs • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with permaculture, life design, social design, design web, facilitation, zettelkasten, dreaming circle, vision, brainstorm, mind map, mental inventory, bullet journaling, year compass, burn rate, 4 questions, Holmgren principles, functions and elements

Background

After the recent completion of his courses in alternative forms of health care, a close friend intends to set up a business offering these types of therapy for clients. I offered my help in creating a design for his practice. I have run my own business for over ten …


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Design balcony

Posted on 2018-12-27 17:04 in designs • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with permaculture, urban design, SADIMet, 9 ways of observing, ethics, Holmgren principles

Background

Ilona and Stefan want to limit the view from the neighbors. They would like a nice environment to look out onto from their living room.

Design team

The design was done by:

  • Arno Peters (permaculture designer)
  • Ina Heinz (permaculture designer)

Design strategy

We used SADIMet for this design.


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Design Arno's company

Posted on 2018-09-25 22:00 in designs • Modified on 2019-08-28 20:17 • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with permaculture, general design, CEAP, 9 ways of observing, client interview, ethics, attitudinal principles, Holmgren principles

Background

I currently work for a few customers as a programmer and for a few others as a systems administrator for their Linux systems.

Current situation (2018) is a physical servers at two different locations. One is in a local data center with a optic fiber connection and one is …


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Project Gunsleben - General design - Planning phase

Posted on 2018-07-13 17:00 in designs • Modified on 2018-07-24 13:00 • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with permaculture, dragon dreaming, dragon dreaming planning, Gunsleben, ethics, Holmgren principles, 6 ways to die, dragon dreaming celebrating, abandoned design

This is the place where we analyze and consider alternatives. See the design overview for the big picture.

Note: this design has been abandoned.

Consideration of Alternatives

Ethics

  • Earth care
    • Reduce
      • create small living spaces, easily heated
      • use solar energy where possible
      • limited use of power tools, tractors and other …

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Design Arno's life

Posted on 2018-05-30 22:00 in designs • Modified on 2019-09-29 21:14 • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with permaculture, social design, CEAP, 3 happy lives, ikigai, ethics, attitudinal principles, Holmgren principles, web of goals, core human needs, early retirement extreme

This is a permaculture design design for my life. This page documents the process and the design. I used CEAP as the design process.

Collect information

Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.

—Aristotle

Knowing yourself …


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Design Arno's backyard (2018)

Posted on 2018-05-24 14:00 in designs • Modified on 2018-12-30 23:05 • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with permaculture, garden design, Eindhoven, CEAP, client interview, ethics, zones and sectors, 9 ways of observing, attitudinal principles, Holmgren principles

This is the main design for the backyard. It ties the other designs for the garden together.

Arno's jungle on 2018-05-18

Backyard in the middle of May 2018.

My front yard and back yard provide the perfect practice ground for trying out new ideas. These pages document some of the ideas I have executed …


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Compost bin in Arno's backyard (2018)

Posted on 2018-05-23 14:00 in designs • Written by Arno Peters • Tagged with permaculture, backyard, compost, CEAP, Holmgren principles

This is a design for the compost bin in Arno's backyard.

2018-05-08

Background

Designer: Arno Peters.

Design strategy

I used CEAP in designing this.

Collect site information

See site information for all collected information on the backyard.

The Humanure Handbook from Joseph Jenkins provides great insight into composting.

I watched several …


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