wholesystemsdesign News Feed

Whole Systems Skills Launched

Sun, 07 Feb 2010 14:15:00 -0600

10 years in the making, a learning organization takes form to train and share tools and techniques needed to respond to the unprecedented challenges of the early 21st Century including peak oil, climate change, economic impossibility and other resource system failure. Please click below to view the workshops. Click HERE if your browser doesn't show a viewable graphic above.

Rice Paddy Installation and end of Summer

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 14:10:00 -0600

Double rice paddy trials and production area for 2010

Rice seeds from 2009 trials for paddies above in 2010:

Wine cap stropharia growing in fruit tree groves:

Design Gallery Premier

Sun, 27 Sep 2009 19:29:00 -0500

Vermont's Future Past: 21st Century Land Use & the New Commons
At the Big Picture Theater and Cafe in Waitsfield, Vermont
$2 Switchback Pints
Opening Remarks, Reception & Live Music- Thursday, October 1st, 5:30pm
Design Gallery- October 1st through October, 29th
Presentation & Discussion- Thursday, October 29th, 5:30pm
Join Whole Systems Design's exploration of a land use for the long haul. This presentation and gallery offers a view of and opportunity to dialogue around the work involved in regenerating Vermont's landscape of abuse and abandonment. The gallery highlights leading-edge strategies toward localizing and solarizing our most basic resource systems such as food and fuel, to be more productive and resilient as we enter an age of peak oil, rapid climate change and economic collapse.
Whole Systems Design's work focuses on the recolonization of rural landscapes from hillsides to former town commons in the transition from a fossil-fuel, import-based economy-culture to a renewable and place-based economy-culture.
Please Join us to contemplate, visualize, discuss and celebrate the future of Vermont.
Click for pdf flyer.

Fuelwood Hedges Continue

Fri, 01 May 2009 20:47:00 -0500

We continue planting fuelwood hedges this spring, lining out another 700 feet of hedge to be managed as a perpetual cordwood supply for wood heating. The hedges will be coppiced and cut repeatedly, resprouting each time. We're after the energy dense wood, timber, nectar (honey), berries, soil fertility and other benefits of using trees and shrubes like black locust, speckled alder, seaberry, hazelnut and many others.

Biochar Production Resumes

Fri, 01 May 2009 20:40:00 -0500

Various Deans Mtn Farm projects underway since snow melt include turning the char made last fall from scrap building wood piles into the ultra durable soil amendment. We are applying the char to both perennial and annual planting zones in various ways and recording each treatment for comparison as each area treated develops.

Ben Falk to Headline at NE Grows

Tue, 30 Dec 2008 14:19:00 -0600

Ben to present on Design for Climate Change and Peak Oil at the annual NE Grows Conference in Boston on February 4th, 2009.

Litchfield County, CT Master Plan Initiated

Fri, 05 Dec 2008 11:44:00 -0600

This winter WSD will be planning the development of a residence, farm and corporate retreat setting on a 100 acre wooded site in Northwestern CT.

Perpetual Fuelwood System Research and Development

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 11:36:00 -0500

In an effort to advance home heating security, fuel security, and forest sustainability in Vermont, New England (and the cold climate world in general) WSD is conducting research and development on the production of concentrated fuelwood via rapid biomass producing hedges. Such fuelwood producing systems simultaneously build soil fertility (via mulching, root zone soil interactions and NO2-fixation) and sequester atmospheric carbon. Trials include tree crop production of hybrid willow species, speckled alder and hybrid poplars. Test sites includes Deans Mtn., Teal Farm, and in the future Northfield and Warren project sites. We are in grant writing phase for a test plot along the I-89 interstate corridor in Vermont and are continually seeking input and collaborators in this process. The most economical and regenerative short term application would likely be along the 300 miles of Vermont's interstate corridors (and the 46,837 miles/426,378 acres of interstate corridor in the United States highway system). Read more about this idea in Ben Falk's interview in the VT Commons Magazine.

View gallery in process.

Northfield Farm, Homestead and Agri-tourism Site in Development

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 10:46:00 -0500

WSD implements master plan for a small-scale intensive farm raising chickens, goats, pigs, diversified vegetables, small fruits, fruit and nut trees, fish and wetland crops such as watercress. In collaboration with the clients, WSD produced a master site plan and is nearing the end of the first season of site development which has included pond design and construction, greenhouse design and construction, tree crops, perennial flowers and medicinals, and more. See project gallery.

WSD's Work Featured in Fast Company Magazine

Sat, 26 Apr 2008 00:04:00 -0500

Is mainstream business waking up to the benefits of truly valuable land use and integrated design? Well, maybe not completely, but they seem to be catching on slowly. Here's one angle on our work from that end of the spectrum. Note, the last line (quote) should read "imagination" instead of "information". (The world's got plenty of info.)

Ben Falk to Present at Creating Regenerative Schools

Wed, 26 Mar 2008 18:14:00 -0500

Design for Climate Change workshop to be part of this event in Boston... "In practical ways this workshop will examine how schools can create campuses that look beyond sustainability towards schools that are resilient and regenerative in the face of complex and rapidly changing ecological, social and economic conditions..." Click here for more information.

WSD to Develop Site and Organization to Pursue Rural Land Use Best Practices

Sat, 23 Feb 2008 20:47:00 -0600

WSD has been contracted to develop a regenerative and working land use model and organization in the Mad River Valley, VT. The future site will be planned over the coming months for development into a permaculture farm system. The organizational design and development process will model replicable steps that others can utilize to develop similar profitable, regenerative farming and community land use systems in their own location. Much more on this project to come... See project gallery.

Teal Farm Featured in Regeneration TV Show

Fri, 08 Feb 2008 20:41:00 -0600

WSD's long term master planning, site design and site development project, the Teal Farm, was recently featured on a television series. Click here to see the video clip.

Master Planning with the Cape Eleuthera Island School and Institute, Bahamas

Tue, 07 Aug 2007 19:06:00 -0500

The Cape Eleuthera Foundation, sponsor of the renowned Island School Semester Program and the newer Cape Eleuthera Institute, has engaged Whole Systems Design in master planning, site design and project communications. The Cape projects, located in the rural Bahamian archipelago, have become known over the past decade for pushing the envelope of sub-tropical sustainable development. WSD is working with the Foundation to communicate the project's past accomplishments, plan the immediate and long-term developments of its dual-campus facility and communicate future endeavors of this sustainable development model. Visit www.islandschool.org and www.ceibahamas.org for more information on the project. View Gallery

New Whole Systems Design Studio Underway

Thu, 12 Jul 2007 20:47:00 -0500

To meet rapidly growing business needs WSD is building a new studio and workshop at the Moretown, Vermont proving ground site. The dual purpose design-build space will model the best in sustainable ecological design and construction. The structure been timber-framed entirely from lumber that has been horse-logged from the property's 4 acres of woodlot. Posts and beams of maple, ash, cherry, beech, hemlock and pine have been felled, hauled and milled on site. The building combines super insulated Larson Truss walls and roof, passive solar heating, and daylit interiors of hardwood and clay plaster finishes. The structure's pond-side setting maximizes its climate integration with the site helping to lower heating needs, promote interior light across the seasons and extend the seasons of use for outdoor living and growing spaces near the building. View Gallery

Design for Climate Change Course Launched

Wed, 20 Jun 2007 09:10:00 -0500

Whole Systems Design to offer this course at the Yestermorrow Design-Build School in Warren, VT. The pioneering course will be possibly the first in the country dedicated wholly to this topic. Visit Yestermorrow for more information.

Middlebury College Turns to WSD for Organic Farm Development

Wed, 06 Jun 2007 16:47:00 -0500

View Gallery or View Business Week Article
Middlebury College continues to be a national leader of sustainable development in higher education and they have turned to WSD for site design and development. WSD will be providing a preliminary master plan and planting of edible perennials to protect and enhance the productivity and uses of the College’s organic farm. Whole Systems Design will also be facilitating a planting workshop weekend in early May where students, faculty, and alumni will be planting the site’s windbreaks and edible trees and shrubs. This project marks the beginning of a perennial permaculture system at Middlebury and will heighten the campus’ role as a learning landscape where students positively apply their studies in the real world. This site offers students the unique opportunity to become leaders in shaping the sustainable food systems of our future

Burlington, VT newspaper highlights WSD's culinary earth work

Sun, 20 May 2007 16:32:00 -0500

"One exciting way to expand the number of local species is to fashion microclimates in which the prevailing temperature is different from that of surrounding areas. Creating windbreaks of nut-bearing trees and using passive solar landscape design — where water and rocks capture the sun's rays and pass the warmth to the ground — are two options. "It can be 70 degrees [in one small area] when it's 40 degrees elsewhere,"......

Read the article

Neshobe Farm residential development contracts WSD

Fri, 11 May 2007 16:41:00 -0500

A forward-thinking sustainable agriculture housing development taps into WSD for master planning and establishment of edible landscape components for future house sites and public spaces within the property.

Visit Neshobe Farm

WSD Featured TV Show Regeneration: The Art of Sustainable Living

Wed, 02 May 2007 16:33:00 -0500

New television show, Regeneration: The Art of Sustainable Living features the work of Whole Systems Design.
Read the interview transcript.
Watch a clip

Whole Systems Design to plant 4,000 multifunctional trees and shrubs this spring.

Fri, 27 Apr 2007 16:31:00 -0500

The intentional ecosystems into which these plants are integrated will remove roughly 8 - 20 million pounds of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere within a human lifetime. WSD is formulating a comprehensive land-use response to challenges posed by rapid changes in both the local and global climate. Projects this season include over 300 species and varieties of fruits, nuts, berries, nectary and soil-building plants. Cultivating abundant ecologies that will be resilient in the face of climate change requires buffering the local climate of the site and enhancing the species diversity on site. Landscapes with high biodiversity and elements that are arranged to protect and enhance the local (micro) climates of the site are most adaptive to increased climatic challenges.

University of Vermont Permaculture Course in August

Fri, 20 Apr 2007 16:29:00 -0500

A 3 Credit Environmental Studies and Plant/Soil Science sponsored course in regenerative land-use and temperate climate settlement strategies.

University of Vermont Permaculture Course in August (PDF):

Visit UVM's summer course website for registration.

Island School Permaculture Design course offered

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 16:25:00 -0600

Whole Systems Design and the Island School teach sustainable site development on degraded lands.

View PDF or View Gallery

Whole Systems Design to plant one of the most extensive and biodiverse agricultural ecosystems on the planet at Teal Farm.

Fri, 01 Dec 2006 16:23:00 -0600

Master planning and site design began September 2005 with installation commencing summer 2006, and orchard planting continuing into 2007.

View Gallery

The Lawrenceville School Honored for Campus Sustainability

Thu, 16 Nov 2006 16:27:00 -0600

Whole Systems Design's outdoor classroom and food garden design a highlight in the school's innovative approach to experiential and sustainability education.

Lawrenceville School Honored for Campus Sustainability or View Gallery