Austin Monthly Magazine
“The love affair Central Texans have with jasmine—there is nothing next to it. Maybe crepe myrtles,” says Mia Anguiano, owner of Full Circle Urban Permaculture. Requiring less maintenance, reducing waste, and saving money, permaculture mimics natural ecosystems—and in recent years, Anguiano and other Austin landscape designers have seen demand for native plants and hardier gardens soar.
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"Largely, I am not a landscape designer; what we do is art. We’re artists! I can draw out a design and figure out where every last thing will go down to the letter, but if on the day it doesn’t look or seem right, we’ll change it. We want it to look natural, elegant, and almost imperfect. Because nature is imperfect in its perfections, you can only have things lined up and spaced out equally. It won’t look like nature."
A vision to save the planet, one house at a time
Owner and operator Mia Anguiano truly believes that permaculture can save the planet.
Walking through your typical central Austin house lot, Mia kicks at the dusty soil underneath a large pecan tree.
A Texas native, she has been watching more and more landscapes turn to dust as the summers get hotter.
"Most people don't understand how water flows. They don't know that what they plant and how they plant it can effect everything on their property." The effect she is referring to is called water sinkage - and she is on a mission to sink as much water as she can, one house at a time.
Water sinkage is the permaculture land management practice that diverts water that would typically run off of land and into storm drains. "This is bad for the water ways, wildlife and humans alike. It affects us all. It's full circle."
Yard by yard, acre by acre, Mia is on a mission to subvert standard landscaping techniques with sustainable, permaculture practices.
"This is for our land, our families and our future. We need this now."
Mia received her accredited certification in 2019 at the Austin Permaculture Guild for design. During the past 5 years, she has overseen the installation of over 40 landscapes that she and her partner personally designed. Her father was a contractor and her grandfather was a contractor.
Before starting FCUP in the wake of pandemic in 2020, Mia had been an early education provider for 10 years, specializing in working with neurodiverse children.