Jo Petroni

I'm a strategic advisor based in France, working with people responsible for places that matter. My background is architecture, but the work I do now happens before architectural decisions. When foundational clarity can still shape what comes next.

My practice centres on estate advisory, place-based strategy, and the kind of deep work required when you're stewarding something meant to last beyond your lifetime. Whether that's a multi-generational legacy estate, a substantial property acquisition, or the internal integration that makes any of it sustainable.

The through-line: everything starts with listening. To what a place is trying to become. To what people actually need, underneath what they think they want. To the patterns that reveal themselves when you pay attention long enough.

Current Work

Advisory

Primary Practice

Strategic counsel for families navigating inherited estates, substantial property acquisitions, and multi-generational planning. Working with 3-5 properties per year through complex decision-making that shapes the next century.

Most engagements begin with a Property Intelligence Report - comprehensive site assessment and strategic framework - before moving into ongoing advisory work.

Estate Advisory Intelligence Reports Developers

Listen to Your Land

Methodology

The framework that underpins everything. Understanding place through technical observation and contemplative practice. What I teach to developers, practice with families inheriting land, and share through writing and occasional intensives.

Twice a year I run Place Journaling - a four-week contemplative practice moving through Earth, Water, Air, Fire. The rest of the year, it's essays and one-on-one mentoring work.

Methodology Substack

Architecture

Foundation

Second-generation architect with practice focused on bioclimatic design and place-responsive work. This foundation informs the strategic advisory work. Technical competence in service of better decision-making.

Architecture Work

Integration Mentoring

Individual Work

One-on-one work with people holding projects or places beyond their current capacity. Deep integration work - excavating what's actually holding you back, building internal structures that match external responsibility. Not for everyone. Very effective for those it's for.

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Background

Second-generation architect. Grew up on building sites, learned to read plans before books.

That foundation led to architecture school, then practice in bioclimatic design. But the real work revealed itself through watching people make decisions. Families paralysed by inherited estates, owners about to spend millions without understanding what they had, brilliant technical solutions fighting what a place was actually about.

The shift from architect to strategic advisor happened gradually. Clients needed clarity before the architecture work. Someone to help with long-term strategy, navigate family dynamics, understand the place itself before committing resources. That's where Listen to Your Land emerged, and where estate advisory work followed.

Currently working internationally across Europe and the United States, testing the methodology across different bioregions.

Second-generation architect · Bioclimatic design expertise · Pioneer member, The Biophilic Society · Active practice across Australia, Southern California, and France · Specialist in integrated site reading for fire-prone, water-stressed, and climate-exposed landscapes

Advisory

Listen to Your Land

Architecture

Integration Mentoring

Second-generation architect. Grew up on building sites, learned to read plans before books.

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