Introduction
Components are defined as the actual physical
elements or social arrangements that are included in a design.
They are the things manipulated in a design to achieve our goals.
Components serve specific functions and are factors of cost for
preservation, installation, implementation and operation.
The physical components are what landscape architects call hardscape
and softscape. The hardscape components are buildings, roads and
walks, utility infrastructure, patios and terraces, dams, walls
and fences and so on. The softscape includes all the existing
vegetation and proposed planting areas. To be complete in our
permaculture thinking, we should also include the bioscape of
all the living beings on the site from soil microbes to larger
animals.
The social components are the arrangements made by people for
the use and management of the design. At a basic level the social
component is one or two people using a house and garden to meet
needs. At a more complex level, the social component is co-housing
agreements and arrangements, plans for managing pests, time schedules
for planting or other activities, financial plans, or any other
specific approaches or controls attached to the physical aspects
of the design to make it function.
Bill Mollison suggests components include site, energy, social
and abstract (timing, data, ethics). Our approach places his site
and energy under physical components and his social and abstract
under social components. In the end it is the idea of components
that is important, not how they are placed in categories. Make
your own arrangement. The goal is to achieve a design where we
have "a beneficial assembly of components in their proper
relationships." (Permaculture, pg. 37)
First we need to understand each component through an analysis
of its intrinsic characteristics, needs, and products and behaviors
as in the classic "chicken" example. (Permaculture,
pg. 38) Then we need to make connections between components by
"putting them in the right place," "arranging connections"
we want to achieve, and "observing and regulating" what
we have done. The better we make our connection of components
the more self-regulating the system will become. (Permaculture,
pg. 39) Think of design elements as having hands that need to
be grasped by the appropriate hands of other elements.
Major components of design are reviewed on the following pages.
