books (302)

Breakfast This Morning With Louie, Titsch, and Kyle

I took off early Wednesday morning with Yogan, my carpenter friend from France. This is Friday morning, so I’m not posting chronologically, but this is hot off the press: at breakfast this morning with Louie and Titsch*, this little boy walked up holding one of our Tiny Homes mini books, showing it to me. “Where’d you get that,” I asked.

“You gave it to me last year.”

Earlier this morning, I’d given a Tiny Homes On the Move mini book to a 3-year-old girl sitting at our able and she started going through it page by page and then said, “This is really cool.”

Made my day, to say the least.  Kids are with us.

Here’s Kyle Radic, driving south to San Francisco with his mom and she said he’d brought along his favorite book:

Photo by Titsch Jones

*Titsch and I were born on the same day (not the same year), and my mother’s maiden name was Jones, so I consider him my brother. He’s from Wales.

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Shelter Publicity

I’m posting this here so it can be accessed by people on my GIMME SHELTER newsletter list. I don’t think it’s of much interest to general readers of this blog, other than people in the publishing trade.

I started doing these newsletters about 20 years ago, inspired by Carl Lennertz’ newsletter to Random House reps, and George Young’s weekly newsletter, “Verbal Abuse,” to Ten Speed reps. There are about 600 people on this mailing list, but this one is being sent just to reps and PGW sales people.

As with my blog, these newsletters have wandered all over the place with subject matter, but this time I want to focus on Shelter’s condition in this ever-changing and ever-loving (yes, still!) world of book publishing.

To tell the truth, I wish we could just stay out here in our ivory-tower-in-the-garden, turn out one book after the other, and they’d sell crazily—but it just doesn’t work that way. Sales of our books have dropped off, and it’s prompted us to review recent publicity, the phenomenal feedback of late on our building books, and current sales and marketing of Shelter books.

I’m sorry this is so long (but I “…didn’t have the time to make it shorter.”

Read More …

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Mark & Meg’s Half Acre California Coastal Farm

On which they grow 60-70% of all their own food.

I’m going to post sneak previews of our next book, Small Homes, once in a while, as I proceed with layout. There will be 6 pages with photos of Mark and Meg’s home, built out of recycled wood, and garden.

I’m experimenting with Twitter to post references to other websites; it’s quicker than blogging. https://twitter.com/lloydkahn

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The More Probable Continuation of This Blog

When I wrote about ending this blog 2 days ago, I was in what you might call a state of mild confused desperation. These (warm summer) days, I’m:

• (joyfully) working on a new book

• trying to figure out how to get more of our books out in bookstores (where people can see them, and pick them up…)

• revamping our digital communications

• shuffling a ton of other things I want to do right now. 

Life is rich.

Thank you guys for the comments. I mean, really! Stephanie gets it. I love ya too, Stephanie. So good to hear I’m connecting.

With the process of iteration, here’s where I’m at this morning:

I’ll keep the blog going. Thanks, George, Rick, Sharkey, etc.

I won’t keep trying to do a post a day. Too stressful, and causing me to sometimes put up less-than-great stuff just to fill in daily gaps. I’ll do a lot less posting stuff from other websites, but put up original material, stuff I’ve done or witnessed, photos new to the internet world. If you were checking it daily, now check it weekly.

Blogs aren’t going to be eliminated by social media, any more than radio was eliminated by TV, or TV eliminated by the internet. They all have their function.

Other digital stuff In discussions yesterday with my two 30-something-year-old consultants, Sean Hellfritsch and my son Evan, we roughed out a plan: I’m going to do Instagram posts from an iPhone 6 (mostly when I’m out and around in the world). I’ll also start tweeting again (fun!). We’ll figure out how to coordinate our extensive home/shelter/building content on my blog, theshelterblog, Instagram, Tumbl’r, Twitter, linking back and forth. Facebook too. Sean’s going to come up with a plan, Evan’s going to do much of the posting. We’ll get the plan together when Rick and Lew are back.

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The Very Possible End of this Blog

In the ’60s I had a friend is Santa Barbara, a highly-skilled gardener, tell me this about the growth of his pot plants: they’d not grow much for a week or so, then suddenly in 24 hours they’d grow like crazy. We talked about how knowledge was like that. You’ll take in information and ponder something over a period of time and suddenly—eureka!—you’ll get it. You get the whole picture. You see the way forward.

Well here’s my growth spurt of the last few days. It may be premature to write this, but I think I see a new way to get out our “content*”) out to (more) people.

I’ve been pondering mostly Instagram and Twitter, but also Facebook (ugh!), Pinterest, maybe Tumblr as a better way than blogging. I’ve done almost 5,000 posts now, some 7 million page views, I think it’s time to hang it up, or at least quit trying to do a post a day. I’ve been running it like a mini-newspaper, and I love doing it, but it’s taking too much time. Maybe I’ll just do my own material on this blog and not keep posting interesting stuff from other websites.

Small Homes

I’m laying out about 2 pages of this new book each day. Once I get the photos and text on the design table, it seems to assemble itself. Oh this fits here…I’ll put the pull quote here…Line this up both up and across…I love doing it—watching the birth of a book. A lot of material came in today—photos and stories.

I need to put more time into the book now, less on the blog.

Plus it’s occurring to me that blogs may be less significant these days, what with these super-sized phone screens and the fact that people are checking Instagram and Facebook daily whereas one has to go to a blog. I only look at blogs occasionally.

Lloyd’s Change of Direction

The iPhone 6 Plus! Holy shit! What a tool. I’ve run across 3 of them in the last 5 days. Yesterday my friend Jeff said, “Have you seen the billboards with photos shot on the iPhone 6?” I’ve kept saying I’d rather shoot quick photos with my many-featured Sony Cybershot RX100 II—raw files, tons of options not on any phone. But the camera seems v. good on the new iPhone and it’ll allow me to post stuff immediately, without having to shoot pix, load them on computer, use wi-fi, blah blah blah…Just zap from the phone. Immediate communication.

It’s gonna be fun, because I run across so much interesting stuff out in the world.

Looking forward to doing Twitter again. Forced to edit self.

*I have probably 15,000 (film and digital ) photos from 50+years—maybe half of them on homes, builders, building, architecture, most of it never used.

Live Broadcast of Small Homes

We’re going to try publishing excerpts from this book as we lay it out. Need to figure how to do so efficiently…hey, what about publishing quick photos of rough layout like this, along with a paragraph about the builder/homeowners? Would that work? The above layout:

“Jes Nelee’, musician and world traveler, designed and built her own small home in Tulsa, Oklahoma, with the help of her 80-year-old grandfather and friends.”

We could do that real simply. Get out on theshelterblog plus other social media.

Just sayin…

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Shelter Looking for Apprentice or Part Time Employee and/or Website Designer

The paradox is that we’re getting this incredible feedback, now daily, and sales of our books have dropped off. We want to:

1. Redesign our website

2. Get Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter and our blogs working to reach people. We have tons of “content.”

3. Produce more short videos

4. Consult with internet-savvy people

5. Get word out more broadly about our books

6. Get theshelterblog audience large enough so we get income from it.

Ideally we’d find a person who who understands blogs, “social media,” and how to build a new website.

Contact us if you or anyone you know might be interested in working with us: shelter@shelterpub.com

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Will, Lloyd and the Rainbow Girls

I went to see the Rainbow Girls Friday night and thought they were fantastic. Great vocal harmonies, and they all kept switching instruments. After they finished, my son Will (a drummer) and I were talking to them outside the bar and Will mentioned that I had published Tiny Homes and one of them screamed, “Oh I love that book!” Pretty soon we were hanging out with all 4 of them. They all knew at least one of our books.

Check them out:

People in Oregon: they’ll be there August 26th-30th: https://www.rainbowgirlsmusic.com/

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Small Homes Book Under Production

I’m rolling with layout of Small Homes. It’s like magic: I start with a bunch of photos and columns of text and start assembling. I’ll pick a lead photo and blow it up on my little (inexpensive)  6-year-old Brother DCP-9040CN color printer/copier and start laying things down, getting pics to size on the copy machine, shifting stuff around, adding text, taping it down with Scotch removable tape and voila, it’s lookin pretty good.

Note: we want to hear what people are doing about shelter in cities (other than paying $3500/month for a studio apartment in San Francisco). Email us at smallhomes@shelterpub.com

I’ve got so much going on right now, what with the book production, and also due to the fact that our sales have dropped off (in the midst of incredible feedback), so we’re working on marketing. Goal is to get people in bookstores just to pick up one of our books.

I’m back in the water after about 20 years of running (mostly on the mountain). Swimming and paddling my (12′ Joe bark Surftek) paddleboard, which whisks through the water. The other day I got in a strong outgoing tide, paddling hard, and was going at least 10 mph, if not 15, water spraying from the bow, pretending I was a speedboat. The water in the ocean is uncharacteristically warm right now. Some days 65 degrees. Am I in LA?

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Changes In My Blog

Truth be told, I love doing blog posts. I find so much that’s fascinating in my everyday life that I want to tell (and show) others about it. (I have a large backlog of photos and observations that I never get around to posting—hey, how do I get a clone?)

I also enjoy the blog feedback.

Problem is, it takes time, and I need to shift gears now that I’ve started a new book. Also, I’m probably more useful to more people doing books than doing blog posts. We’re getting almost daily feedback on how our books are inspiring people to create their own homes.

I’ll try to keep the blog rolling, posting less frequently in the near future.

Also, we’re trying to figure out how to get our considerable “content” out via “social media.” We’re looking for advice on how to coordinate Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, Tumbler, and our website (drastically in need of overhaul) and 2 blogs to maximize exposure.

I’m especially interested in reaching millenials because, if you’ll excuse the mixed metaphor, they’re a whole new ball game. I just love these guys—they’re looking at the world through fresh eyes.

I’ve done layout of 12 pages of Small Homes now and am in full gear with it. Contact us if you know of any practical, aesthetic, inspiring, economical and/or homey homes in the 400-1200 sq. ft. range: smallhomes@shelterpub.com

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Our Next Book – SMALL HOMES – Now In Production

I started 3 days ago. My M.O. is to open the file drawer and start picking out folders (there are 50-60 now) to work on.

I pick them out randomly and start doing layout— with scissors and removable scotch tape. No stinkin computers at this stage.

I print out the text in 3 & 4 columns, adjust photos to desired size on copy machine, and do rough layouts.

This is turning out to be really fun. We’ve accumulated material for maybe a year and now, the book is starting to assemble itself, in random manner. Organizing will come later.

Note: contact us if you know of small homes (400-1200 sq. ft.) that would work in this book:

smallhomes@shelterpub.com

We are especially interested in any kind of homes in cities and towns.

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