Stephanie Ladwig-Cooper is co-owner with her husband of Gaia Creations -Ecological Landscaping and Permaculture Solutions. Since 2000 Stephanie and her husband, Brian, have provided ecological land care solutions for residential and commercial properties in the Northern Sacramento Valley of California.

Stephanie received her permaculture design certificate from Cathe' Fish and Neil Bertrando in March of 2009, took the course again in 2011 with her husband and eldest son (who was 10 years old at the time) and has since taught permaculture workshops and co-taught PDC's in the area.

In 2009 Stephanie worked with 2 other local permaculturists to form the Chico Permaculture Guild (CPG) in Chico, CA. This local group continues today as a program of the newly formed 501(c)(3) nonprofit, Earthshed Solutions. The CPG has been successful providing free monthly gatherings and low to no cost workshops for the local community. In addition, the CPG helped form the Chico Seed Lending Library (CSLL) in 2013.

Currently Stephanie provides permaculture consulting and design services through her business, is President and Programs Director for Earthshed Solutions and a seed librarian for the Chico Seed Lending Library. Stephanie homeschools her 2 older children and is working with her family on their 5 acre farm to develop the site as a permaculture based teaching/demonstration property for the local community.

Urban Permaculture Property Tour

At long last we are able to provide a public tour of our business project site in celebration of International Permaculture Day!

Due Diligence: Four O’clock Plants

Four O'clock plants have a long history of cultivation and use around the world as well as serve many useful functions, with more to experiment with -as a dye and dynamic accumulator.

Berries, Trellising and Harvest

A short but sweet article about berries and how we trellis them for harvesting. I used Google SketchUp to refined a berry trellis design which allows for easy harvest and tons of yield.

Teaching Permaculture for the Community and Future

My husband and I will be teaching an Introduction to Permaculture Workshop next month in Chico, CA. We've been encouraged for a while now by many friends, Clients, and fellow permies to "Please teach!"... so we are!

BEYOND COMPANION PLANTING – 'Guild Building' a Forest Garden

How we put together forest gardens by guild building using species matrix charts and more. This is a follow up article to a companion planting piece I wrote about last year.

Lego Sheet Mulch Example

Utilizing the layers for sheet mulching my children made up a Lego sheet mulch example and I couldn't resist writing about how we've gone about it over the years.

Companion Planting Information and Chart

Updated chart of basic companion plants we've grown successfully over the years.

Urban Permaculture Project -2 years in progress

We're writing on-going articles about the many aspects of this urban permaculture project in a Mediterranean climate 2 years underway. Pool to pond conversion -complete!

Permaculture Student Intern turned Assistant and Upcoming PDC with Robyn Francis and Cathe’ Fish

Being a permaculture intern for the last 3 years has been a rich and rewarding experience. Even before I took my PDC I began working with my future PDC instructor helping out with marketing, introductory workshops and design certification courses.

An Elderberry Volunteers -Applying Permaculture Principle Number One in Our Backyard

An photo based article about applying the permaculture principle of observation in our residential backyard and the often hard decision to interact with natural patterns or not.

From grass to habitat garden... our front yard 2005-2011

A detailed account of the transition from a sparse and chemical dependent landscape to an ecologically diverse and resource efficient garden.

Permaculture, Children and Family

Our family is deeply immersed in permaculture and we find it immeasurably rewarding to pass this knowledge onto our children.

Currents projects

2 of my residential permaculture projects in Chico, CA...