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Summer Beam Books
The Permaculture City: Regenerative Design for Urban, Suburban, and Town Resilience by Toby Hemenway
The Permaculture City: Regenerative Design for Urban, Suburban, and Town Resilience by Toby Hemenway
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The Permaculture City: Regenerative Design for Urban, Suburban, and Town Resilience by Toby Hemenway
Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing Company
US SRP: $24.95 US
Binding: Paperback
Copyright Date: 2015
Pub Date: July 14, 2015
Physical Info: 0.7" H x 9.5" L x 7.5" W (1.3 lbs) 288 pages
Permaculture is more than just the latest buzzword; it offers positive solutions for many of the environmental and social challenges confronting us. And nowhere are those remedies more needed and desired than in our cities.
The Permaculture City provides a new way of thinking about urban living, with practical examples for creating abundant food, energy security, close-knit communities, local and meaningful livelihoods, and sustainable policies in our cities and towns. The same nature-based approach that works so beautifully for growing food--connecting the pieces of the landscape together in harmonious ways--applies perfectly to many of our other needs. Toby Hemenway, one of the leading practitioners and teachers of permaculture design, illuminates a new way forward through examples of edge-pushing innovations, along with a deeply holistic conceptual framework for our cities, towns, and suburbs.
The Permaculture City provides a new way of thinking about urban living, with practical examples for creating abundant food, energy security, close-knit communities, local and meaningful livelihoods, and sustainable policies in our cities and towns. The same nature-based approach that works so beautifully for growing food--connecting the pieces of the landscape together in harmonious ways--applies perfectly to many of our other needs. Toby Hemenway, one of the leading practitioners and teachers of permaculture design, illuminates a new way forward through examples of edge-pushing innovations, along with a deeply holistic conceptual framework for our cities, towns, and suburbs.
The Permaculture City begins in the garden but takes what we have learned there and applies it to a much broader range of human experience; we're not just gardening plants but people, neighborhoods, and even cultures. Hemenway lays out how permaculture design can help towndwellers solve the challenges of meeting our needs for food, water, shelter, energy, community, and livelihood in sustainable, resilient ways. Readers will find new information on designing the urban home garden and strategies for gardening in community, rethinking our water and energy systems, learning the difference between a "job" and a "livelihood," and the importance of placemaking and an empowered community.
This important book documents the rise of a new sophistication, depth, and diversity in the approaches and thinking of permaculture designers and practitioners. Understanding nature can do more than improve how we grow, make, or consume things; it can also teach us how to cooperate, make decisions, and arrive at good solutions.
Toby Hemenway was the author of the first major North American book on permaculture, Gaia's Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture, as well as The Permaculture City. After obtaining a degree in biology from Tufts University, Toby worked for many years as a researcher in genetics and immunology, first in academic laboratories at Harvard and the University of Washington in Seattle, and then at Immunex, a major medical biotech company. At about the time he was growing dissatisfied with the direction biotechnology was taking, he discovered permaculture, a design approach based on ecological principles that creates sustainable landscapes, homes, and workplaces. A career change followed, and Toby and his wife spent ten years creating a rural permaculture site in southern Oregon. He was associate editor of Permaculture Activist, a journal of ecological design and sustainable culture, from 1999 to 2004. He taught permaculture and consulted and lectured on ecological design throughout the country, and his writing appeared in magazines such as Whole Earth Review, Natural Home, and Kitchen Gardener. Toby passed away in 2016.
Review Quotes:
"An invaluable resource for city planners and dwellers alike, as well as an optimistic exploration of the possibilities for ecological well-being in our future urban landscapes."-- Booklist
"An enlightening read for anyone interested in green gardening, environmental ethics, social justice issues, and seeking positive community change."-- Library Journal"Hemenway's intelligent, down-to-earth analyses, astute systems thinking, and clear organization offer a particularly comprehensive, open-ended, and sophisticated yet understandable overview to readers who want to discover, evaluate, utilize, and integrate the untapped resources abundant in any city or town...Hemenway shows how permaculture concepts can be stretched and rethought in an urban setting to include not just one's house, garden, and yard but also neighbors, parks, and city agencies."-- Publishers Weekly
"Many people who are searching for a more fulfilling life, wanting to reduce their ecological footprint and build resilience for uncertain futures, grasp that permaculture might be part of the solution but are often unsure how it applies to their particular situation. For residents of towns and cities in the modern affluent world, The Permaculture City shows how permaculture design makes common sense." --David Holmgren, co-originator of the Permaculture concept
"Toby Hemenway's Gaia's Garden is the go-to book I always recommend for those interested in permaculture. His new book, The Permaculture City, is the much-needed urban version, a great introduction and full of important information on adapting permaculture to an urban environment." --Starhawk, permaculture designer and author of The Empowerment Manual
" The Permaculture City is a triumph in bringing the wisdom of permaculture practices to city dwellers. This book is a 'bridge book' for greening our urban landscapes. Rich in practical knowledge, Toby Hemenway is a trailblazer in demystifying the art of living sustainably within ecosystems: teaching how YOU can be a collaborative partner in a healthy urban biosphere. This book's impact will be increasingly significant as we inevitably march toward living in built environments. For urban planners, architects, green builders, and simply citizens who want to enjoy a higher quality of life, The Permaculture City is The Book to lead the way." --Paul Stamets, author of Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World
"Permaculture is applied ecology, and its practice is evolving as society becomes more urbanized. As Toby Hemenway puts it, 'We're not just gardening plants but people, neighborhoods, and even cultures.' Whether you're new to permaculture or a seasoned 'permie, ' The Permaculture City is essential: it captures the explorative state of the art in readable, often delightful prose. And, like all good permaculture books, it is eminently helpful at solving a myriad of practical problems in the home and garden." --Richard Heinberg, Senior Fellow, Post Carbon Institute
