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Guilds or poly-cultures are a design pattern for arranging companion and functionally beneficial elements into groups that can be deployed either on contour or as small collections of guilds which can cover the landscape.

Borrowing from rain forest layering, from canopy to ground, guilds can contain some or all of the layers to create a successful combination.

Elements chosen are specific in how they provide function at their layer and across the guild. Some are about their size and shape, while others about what they what functions they perform and how they relate to other elements of the guild.

Larger guilds and connected guilds become self sustaining ecosystems over time where all elements that interact with and support this ecosystem are design considerations, with the aim of creating a diversity of elements that support all life and energy forms that will experience it.

To understand where guilds and other system elements should be organised, the entire project area or property is divided into Zones.

By understanding these relationships between elements, they can be designed more consciously and benefit other areas of the system by their design.

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