Toby Hemenway was the author of Gaia’s Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture, which for the last nine years has been the best-selling permaculture book in the world, and was awarded the Nautilus Gold Medal in 2011. He was an adjunct professor at Portland State University, Scholar-in-Residence at Pacific University, and a field director at The Permaculture Institute. Toby presented at major conferences such as Bioneers, SolFest, and EcoFarm, and at Duke University, Tufts University, University of Minnesota, University of Delaware and many other educational venues. His writing appeared in magazines such as Whole Earth Review, Natural Home, WorldWatch Institute and to several publications on ecological design.

In October of 2015, Toby was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Despite treatment that seemed to be working, the cancer returned in the fall, and eventually Toby signed up for home hospice on December 16, 2016. He died on the morning of December 20th, a day after announcing to his many fans, followers, and friends that he was in the last stages of life.

“Of course, we want to live in an attractive landscape. But if we can go beyond what plants look like, and examine what they are doing, we can begin to create gardens that have the health, resilience, and beauty of natural ecosystems while yielding abundant gifts for people and for other species.”