DESIGN YOUR DREAM LIFE

Learn all the tools you need to start designing and living your eco-conscious dream life.

BUILD LASTING CONFIDENCE IN YOURSELF

Develop the self-trust and reliance necessary to know that you will always be safe and supported no matter what is happening in the world around you.

CREATE NEW MEANS OF TRUE PROSPERITY

Open up new pathways and opportunities to thrive off the gifts of the Earth as you share your big vision with the world.

Live Instruction

Learn from world-renowned experts, Penny Livingston & Stephen Brooks, during weekly live video instruction with plenty of Q&A time.

Lifetime Access

Your live classes will be recorded and stored on our student learning platform, so this means you'll have access to the content for life.

Global Community

Connect with a global community of like-minded visionaries. During these trying times, having a community who supports your vision for the world is truly priceless.

Expert Design Reviews

Receive expert feedback from your teachers on your personal Permaculture design project, so you can bring it to life with confidence! We’re all about the real-world application of the principles and want to see you bring this work to your community near and far!

Workbooks & Support Materials

Everything that you need to make the most of your PDC training.

Accreditation

Completing your PDC Online Certification means you’re ready to teach & legally tell the world you're Permaculture certified.  Feel confident in your understanding of the principles so you can support the people who will be helping you bring your dream to life!

Financial Prosperity

The Earth is abundant and when you learn to work with her, you are endlessly supported. This program opens up new pathways and opportunities to create your own self-sufficient, and abundant lifestyle so that you can thrive and share your big dreams with the world.

Plus Surprise Bonuses

Connect with expert guest teachers and intimate musical performances!

Month 1

Introduction to Permaculture

✔️  Ethics and Principles
✔️  The Local Ecosystems
✔️  Zone and Sector analysis
✔️  Philosophy & History
✔️  Ecological Design Principles 
✔️  Cultural Domains

Month 2

Design Methods and Process

✔️ Climates, Biogeography and Microclimates
✔️ The Home System
✔️ Earthworks: Water & Soil
✔️ Patterns and Pattern Application 
✔️ Risk of Climatic Extremes
✔️ Conceptual Design

Month 3

Trees, Forests, Plants, and Cultivated Ecologies

✔️ Animals
✔️ Aquaculture 
✔️ Agroforestry
✔️ Integrated Pest Management 
✔️ Botany
✔️ Propagation
✔️ Polycultures
✔️ Food Gardens
✔️ Medicine Gardens

Month 4

The Built Environment

✔️ Waste and Bioremediation 
✔️ Appropriate Technology 
✔️ Design for Catastrophe 
✔️  Urban Permaculture
✔️  Infrastructure: Renewable Energy

Month 5

Broad-scale Agriculture

✔️  Design for Invisible Structures 
✔️  Economic Systems 
✔️  Land Access
✔️  Energy Conservation
✔️  Design for Function
✔️  Closed-Loop Manufacturing Strategies
✔️  Natural Building vs. Green Building

Month 6

Design Projects and Presentations

✔️ Economic Systems in Design
✔️ Eco-village and Neighborhood Design 
✔️  Intentional Community Building
✔️ Permaculture Scene & Network
✔️ Design Projects and Presentations
✔️ Peer Review

“I took my first permaculture course with Penny sixteen years ago. Studying with her was life changing and life affirming. Penny draws from a rich personal and professional history including projects from around the world and in a diversity of community contexts. From the get go she encouraged me, and believed in my vision of creating a livelihood operating a permaculture program in my region and bringing permaculture into formal academic institutions. She’s powerful and humble, wise and a sacred trickster, hardworking and also knows how to have a good time and make permaculture fun. We’ve always known that change was necessary but now we know that change is possible. Penny continues to be among those at the leading edge of positive change for a peaceful, just and regenerative future.

David Shaw

“I discovered Permaculture at the Real Goods Solar Living Center Solfest Celebration in 2002 or 2003, at a talk with Penny Livingston. In less than an hour, Penny outlined a way of thinking about and interacting with the world that I had been longing for. Her stories, the way she spoke, the words she used all clarified and illuminated another way of understanding, a perspective based on interconnection, the paradigm shift I had been searching for: Permaculture! 

And she said something I would never forget: if you dedicate yourself to this work of healing the earth and people through Permaculture, the doors will open.

I was hooked. I began seeking out opportunities to study with Penny. I love her intuitive style, how she can flow with and respond to the students in her classes in real time, tapping into what is alive in a group and focusing her teaching accordingly, using stories and examples to connect ideas and present the big picture. After a couple of PDC’s and a bunch of dirt time, Penny invited me to join her teaching team. Woohoo! My permaculture career was taking off. 

Now, 14 years later, I teach and co-teach permaculture workshops and design courses in Santa Cruz and the Bay Area, as well as consult on, design and install permaculture landscapes. I taught with Penny for 12 years and I still take every course I can with her! I committed to this path and the doors have opened every step of the way, just like Penny said they would.  Penny’s perspective, teaching and mentorship have been invaluable to me, and now especially, with Coronavirus restrictions and a global revaluation of priorities, I know that I am in the right place.”
- Lydia Neilsen

I have studied permaculture at RDI (Regenerative Design Institute)  with Penny Livingston Stark and found breadth of knowledge and experience in the field to be very inspiring. The work that she has done has been on many continents with large communities and in her own backyard demonstrates her skillful ability to apply the permaculture principles in a variety of effective ways. This quality is invaluable as a teacher. Especially with a practice such as permaculture, which is first and foremost a system of design based on observation. At this moment there is a lot of interest in building profitable farms or self sufficent systems, which is ok. It just needs to start with careful observation of the site and understanding of how natural systems work. In this area, I have seen Penny share creative insights that reveal her intuitive wisdom and experience in the field. A final word of appreciation is for her place as a female trailblazer among the first wave of predominately male permaculture teachers.

 - Doug Miller-Fleig

 I took my first ever PDC in 2014-2015 with Penny Livingston Stark through her Regenerative Design Institute at the Commonweal Garden in Bolinas, CA. At the end of the 12 month-span of the course, I remember writing on my course feedback form the following note to the next year's class: "This course changed my life, and it will change yours; get ready- because everything you think you know is a lie." Taking that course really did change my life- Penny is truly a remarkable, passionate, and wise teacher and mentor. Through her lifetime of work with the Earth and so many peoples all over the world, she has become one of the people who represents the entire Permaculture/Ecological/Transformative movement and does do with such deep respect for all the world's Indigenous peoples and their knowledge which is of course, where Permaculture comes from.

She uses knowledge, research, song, story, and inspiration to teach her students about how we can help save humanity and live in a healthy relationship with Mother Earth and all her creatures. When she started a lecture, I learned very quickly to put my focus completely on what she was saying because every word out of her mouth was fascinating and taught me something new. She has such a warm and loving way about her that immediately made me feel welcome and like I was an important part of helping the Earth and humanity. She knows how to talk about the seriousness of the situation of our current global catastrophe and also is able to remain positive and lighthearted throughout her teaching.  She knows how to mix lecture and hands-on projects in everything we learned. I was so inspired by her that after graduating my PDC, I immediately signed up the following year to work under her and her teaching staff as an assistant, lovingly called an "Acorn". I was an Acorn 2015-16, 2016-17, 2017-18, 2018-2019, and this year 2019-2020. As you can see, I became totally addicted to Penny's message and the message of Permaculture. Being an Acorn, I got to work much more closely with Penny and came to respect, admire, and love her even more. She knows how to reach people and she knows the utmost importance of helping humans live more healthily with Mother Earth, and she knows the ultimate power of the present moment in connecting to people or nature herself. Now that she has moved from Bolinas, I miss her terribly but I also feel amazed by my good fortune of being able to learn from her and work under her for almost five years of my life......I really don't know how I got so lucky.”
- Sarah Loft

"Learning and practicing permaculture has literally changed my life over the past decade and a half.  As a result I actively participate in earth and community healing and resiliency projects which improve food security, water use, soil fertility, bioremediation of toxics, wildlife conservation, racial justice, youth education and more.  Internally, permaculture has given me active hope, a positive solution-based worldview which provide the stamina to address local as well as world scale challenges.  I'd felt frustrated for years working in natural healthcare at what seemed an insufficient positive impact on communities and ecosystems in most need.  As a direct result of the power of permaculture tools,  I changed my career and service paths towards permaculture, finally empowered with the skills to make the kinds of difference I'd longed to make.    Studying permaculture with Penny was some of the most inspiring, resourcing, grounded, expertise-rich study along my permaculture learning journey.  Penny's mastery of the most important aspects of permaculture design and its practical applications, her international experience, multi-climate/bioregion and multi-cultural skills, her ability to both drill into details as well as scaffold the widest terrain with clarity made her teaching compelling.  Penny has a great sense of humor, is a crackerjack story teller and song leader and she creates a community learning container full of vitality.  She is not only a root teacher and rock star in the world of permaculture, she is a great human with a huge and welcoming heart that she shares generously.  Her friendly fierceness made me want to do permaculture more and more permaculture. Anyone would be blessed to be with her and study with one of the most skillful permaculturalists alive.  This small recommendation doesn't begin to do justice to what it's really like to study with her.  If you feel called to be in greater service to Life, study with Penny!  If I had to use one word to describe my experience as Penny's student it would be 'empowering'.  I remain endlessly grateful to her and for her."

- Michelle Nemer, Coast Miwok Terriorty, California, US. Eco Socieals & Activits. 

"My time as a community member and a Permaculture Design Student left an indelible mark on my life. It furthered my convictions that human care and earth care are intertwined as we strive toward a more regenerative future. I will never forget the lessons the land, the community, and my PDC instructor, Stephen Brooks taught me. This education will always be a home I return to."

- Violet Reed

“I had heard a lot about the PDC, but it wasn't until I discovered Stephen Brooks and his initiatives that I decided to take it! I cannot think of earning my PDC without feeling how my heart smiles, learning and sharing in paradise with such an authentic community, is a complete nourishment for the soul. I am so grateful to my teacher, Stephen for not only transmitting so much knowledge to us but for showing us to actually apply all the theory in different spaces of the land and the community. Education in this way achieves the purpose of the student really integrating what has been studied and generates practical tools rather than just mental concepts. Forever grateful to my permaculture certificate!"

- Sofia Mar

“The permaculture course that I took with Stephen Brooks was like being offered a key to a whole new world of possibilities and information that I didn’t know existed. Not only is it a magical place to truly connect and learn from nature, but it is full of knowledgeable and loving people ready to welcome you into the family. This certification will always be a part of me and I am always looking for reasons to go back!”

- Aaron Jacobson, Owner of La Loma Jungle Lodge and Palmar Beach Lodge in Panama