About Contact

Project 1: Site Analysis

What you'll create

An annotated site analysis plan, a sector map, and a supporting report (a document or slide presentation with photos).

Why this matters

This project is about coming to know your site deeply through close observation, research and mapping. A good site analysis shows you where the design challenges and opportunities lie, and it shapes how you respond. Combined with your needs analysis and clear design intent, it gives you a strong foundation for a permaculture design that works.

Taking time at this stage, before you begin designing, makes a world of difference. You'll strengthen your observer's lens and lay down skills you'll use when designing for others. Modules 7 (Reading the Landscape) and 8 (Permaculture Plans) will support you all the way through.

Choosing your site

Choose a place you can visit often. It might be your home, a balcony, a shared block, a community garden, a school, or a friend's farm. If the land belongs to someone else, ask their permission before you begin.

How to approach it

  • Observe over time. Visit your site at different times of day and in different weather. The more often you return, the more your site will reveal.
  • Blend observation and research. Some prompts ask you to look closely on site. Others ask you to find maps, data and history.
  • Use your judgement. Your site's scale and location will shape which prompts are relevant. Answer what fits, briefly note any you've left aside and why, and add your own questions.
  • Note your sources. Record where your data comes from (weather service, local council, maps, books, people you spoke with).
  • Care for cultural knowledge. Indigenous knowledge belongs to its custodians. Draw on publicly shared sources, acknowledge where knowledge comes from, and leave restricted or sacred information out of your work. Local Traditional Owner organisations and land councils are good places to learn more.

What to submit

  1. Annotated site plan. Use a base map (a Google Earth screenshot, a council map, or your own drawing). Include:
    • A north arrow
    • An approximate scale
    • Site boundaries
    • Contours, where available
    • A legend
    • Your observations, annotated directly on the plan
  2. Sector map. Show the external influences and energies affecting your site (sun, wind, storms, fire, water, views, noise, and so on). This can be an overlay on your site plan or a separate map.
  3. Report or presentation. Use this for everything that won't fit on your plan: your responses to the prompts below, site photos, soil test photos, rainfall data and sun arc diagrams, and your summary of opportunities and constraints.

Upload everything as PDFs, images, or slides, combined into as few files as possible.

What I look for

Your project is ready for approval when:

  • your site plan is clear and easy to read, with north, scale, boundaries and a legend
  • each section of the checklist is addressed
  • your observations show time spent on site, alongside your research
  • your soil tests are done and photographed
  • your sector map shows the main external influences on your site
  • you've summarised the key opportunities and constraints that will shape your design
  • your sources are noted

After you submit

I'll review your site analysis and respond with feedback. When it's ready, I'll approve it and you can move on to [Project 2: name]. If it needs more, I'll let you know what to add or explore further, and you can resubmit. This feedback is a valuable part of learning to see a site with a designer's eye.

Questions along the way? Bring them to [community space / live sessions].

Site Analysis Checklist

1. Locate your site

Establish the basics that everything else builds on.

  • Where is your site, and how big is it?
  • What is the name of the Indigenous Country of this site?
  • Where is north on your plan?
  • What is your elevation above sea level?
  • Take a screenshot of your place on Google Earth to use as a base map
  • Find a contour plan for your site
  • Take photos of your site

2. The story of your place

Every site carries a history that shapes what it is today.

  • What traditional and Indigenous knowledge relates to this place?
  • Are there sacred sites or archaeological sites?
  • What is the recent history, including previous land uses and development?

3. Where you sit in the landscape

Zoom out to see your site within its wider living system.

  • Where are you in the water catchment and bioregion?
  • What biome are you in? (rainforest, woodland, temperate forest …)
  • What's happening upstream, upwind, over the fence and on your boundaries?

4. Climate and seasons

Climate shapes almost every design decision you'll make.

  • What is your climate?
  • How many local seasons do you have, and when do they change?
  • How much rainfall do you get each year? Collect monthly rainfall data to see how much falls and when.
  • What seasonal weather events do you get? (snow, frost, storms, monsoons, dry seasons …)
  • What is your sun arc for midsummer and midwinter? (use www.suncalc.org)
  • Research your wind rose.
  • Where do the gentle breezes come from, and when?
  • Where is your storm sector? When do storms come, and what are they like?

5. Landform and geology

The shape of the land and what lies beneath it.

  • What rocks lie beneath you?
  • What is the aspect of your site? (Which direction does your slope face?)
  • How steep is your land? (Try measuring with a clinometer.)
  • Where is there evidence of erosion, and why is it happening?

6. Water

How water arrives, moves through and leaves your site.

  • What are your sources of water? (rivers, springs, marshes, taps, downpipes, sewage …)
  • What water challenges do you face? (drought, flood, erosion …)

7. Soil

Soil is the living foundation of your site.

  • Do simple soil tests: sausage test, jar test, infiltration test and pH. Photograph each.
  • Describe how your soil feels. Is it alive?
  • Where is the soil healthiest? Why?

8. Living systems

Who and what already lives here.

  • What is the type and quality of the natural vegetation? (riparian, sclerophyll, rainforest, hedgerow, woodland …)
  • Are there invasive species on site?
  • What animals, wild and domesticated, live on site? Identify them and note their pathways, habitat and nests.

9. Reading natural indicators

Let the site tell you what's happening. Record what you observe through:

  • soil life and feel
  • weed indicators
  • wind indicators
  • fire indicators
  • wildlife indicators

10. What's already here

Existing elements you'll work with or around.

  • Are there existing garden areas or structures? Locate and describe them.
  • What services exist? (energy, town water, gas, phone, sewage …)
  • Are there any unusual, significant or interesting features? (cave, waterfall …)

11. Hazards and threats

What your design will need to respond to.

  • Is there a bushfire threat? Where would it come from, and when? What is the fire history?
  • What other threats exist? (frost, flood, cyclones …)
  • What pollution sources affect the site? (noise, air, water)

12. Context and constraints

The wider community and the rules that shape what's possible.

  • What's happening in your neighbourhood? Note relevant organisations and businesses.
  • Are there any legal constraints you need to consider? (zoning, covenants, easements, council regulations …)

13. Your personal response

Your own feelings about the site are valuable design information too.

  • Which areas of the site do you like or dislike? Why?
  • Which views do you want to enhance or screen?

14. Bring it together

Draw your observations into insights that will guide your design.

  • Summarise the key opportunities and constraints of the site.
  • Create a sector map summarising the key external influences and impacts.