ABOUT ME
I’m Linnea (pronounced Lin-nay-jah), born and raised in the Netherlands, where I studied to become an experience designer for personalised systems, after which I moved to the North East (on my bike) in 2019. I now live with my partner in a cosy house on the edge of an old-growth forest (just outside Gateshead), and enjoy the great outdoors and lovely people here. I have always had a passion for sustainable sustainability, which I initially pursued as a designer and researcher, but missed a connection with nature in my day-to-day work. I found this in Permaculture Design and obtained my certificate at Permaculture Kernow to start applying this as a garden designer. What brings me the most joy is that I get to share my experience with you, so that we together can create a beautiful garden that you enjoy spending time in and that is also good for the planet!
I have many years of experience with tending to gardens. As a kid, my mother made both my sister and me responsible for our own piece of her urban garden. She is an intuitive gardener, which I adopted, letting plants naturally find their place in the garden and growing perennials with a yield she enjoys, such as gooseberries, poaching pears, as well as pollinator-attracting flowering plants that provide colour throughout the year. Nowadays, whenever I visit, I support her in maintaining her Dutch version of a cottage garden. I got my first rental with a garden when I was 24, which was greatly neglected. I revived that garden by extending the borders and planting plants that would be easy to maintain by the people that would follow. Even when I lived in an apartment in Gateshead with a (generous) balcony, we made large planters from old pallets, had climbers grow up the facade and made space for wildlife. This was rewarded with a family of blue tits nesting in a wooden shoe nesting box! In 2020 we bought a cosy mid-terraced house with a large garden that is my testbed for my Permaculture Journey.
Besides anything garden, my partner and I love going on hikes, camping, and trying out cakes in cafés along the way. We are experienced DIYers slowly renovating our house from top to bottom, and I try to stay sane with yoga and fiddle classes. Family is very important to me, so whenever we get a chance to visit each other I always make a special occasion of it. To practice for this, I grasp any occasion for cooking up a special meal or subjecting friends and family to my hobby of baking cakes that star vegetables (great recipe book by Blackberry cottage).
Would you like to work with me on your garden?
WHAT IS PERMACULTURE?
Permaculture is a design toolkit that uses processes occurring in nature with the scientific knowledge of today, to create ecological human-centred eco-systems making effective use of space and resources available, leaving more room for nature to thrive. It can be applied as large as setting up a sustainable community, including businesses, or as small as redesigning a section of your garden (or even balcony) to have a yield. For example, in a forest, plant communities sustain each other with the help of fungi, microbes and soil critters, by balancing the nutrients present in the soil. If we mimic this, but with plants that all have some use for humans, as food, medicine or building material, we create super-efficient pockets of fertility that require very little maintenance. Designing gardens this way ensures that we can reduce our footprint and leave more room for nature to maintain a balanced eco-system where people and wildlife can thrive. On top of that, having a garden based on Permaculture principles is not only sustainable! They are very aesthetic, high in biodiversity (initially plants and as result wildlife will follow) offering interesting experiences throughout the year. They are low-maintenance, leaving you with more time to enjoy your garden as a relaxing space. And lastly, they provide you with healthy organic produce to share with your family and friends. If you would like to learn more about Permaculture have a look at the links at the bottom of this page.
My permaculture approach is to design a garden that becomes an integrated part of your everyday life that is a welcoming space for every member of your household. I want you to be involved in this process from start to end, so your garden, in the end, becomes YOUR garden. By taking you along in the design process I aim to share a basic understanding of permaculture which you can decide how to move forward with in the future. Don’t have green fingers yet? No problem, they will grow as we go. Because permaculture is based on natural processes I find it a very intuitive approach to gardening (and sustainable living in general) that is easy to adopt and doesn’t require a lot of time and effort. On a budget? Welcome to the world of seeds and cuttings. The beauty about permaculture is that it is a scalable toolkit, how we make it work for your garden is entirely up to you. Does your current garden feel like a challenge, such as a concrete desert, on a steep hillside, or an overgrown jungle? Every challenge is an opportunity to learn, and I am up for that! You will find that any site has its advantages, disadvantages and opportunities, the trick is to turn disadvantages into design opportunities, and then I’m convinced we will always find a way to make it work.
What will your sustainable garden be like?