gardening (218)

Small Homes Book Sneak Preview #2—Homesteading in Montana

August 18, 2015 at 1:54 pm

Just came in for our new book SMALL HOMES:

Hey Lloyd,

Like many others, your books inspired us to build our own home. Four years ago I left a career as a helicopter pilot in the Army with my wife and two kids and moved to the Mission Valley of Montana (north of Missoula). We bought 40 acres of bare hay fields and built an 800 sq ft. house. It was quite an experience since neither one of us had experience with construction. We broke ground in late September, and six weeks later I remember the first snow of the season blasting me in the face as I dryed in the last wall. We finished it more or less over the winter, then went on to build a barn a few years later…still working on that one!

We grow organic produce and pastured hogs and like to farm as much as possible with our draft horses. I’d like to say 800 sq. ft. is working for us, but after four years, we currently are in the midst of adding on, increasing our square footage to about 1800*. With our remodel, we are trying to replicate the classic American Foursquare style of architecture that is widely seen across the country with a few timber framed details here and there. I think we could have lasted longer with a house sized somewhere in between, but this was initially going to be just a small cottage for family to stay in and down the road we would build another house.  therefore we built it without storage in mind. Well we ran out of money and didn’t see the need to do that, so here we are! Nevertheless, its been a wild ride!

Thanks for the inspiration!

Micah & Katie Helser

Yes, it’ll exceed our size limit of 1200 sq. ft., but it was smaller to start, so it’s going in the book. (We have been known to stretch parameters.)

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Mark & Meg’s Half Acre California Coastal Farm

August 14, 2015 at 9:58 pm

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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Family makes last-ditch appeal to save Welsh ‘hobbit house’ from demolition

May 19, 2015 at 7:58 pm

Dear Mr Kahn,

This house is going to be bulldozed because it “does not fit in with the surrounding Pembrokeshire countryside” which has to be the most ridiculous reason there is.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/may/19/family-makes-last-ditch-appeal-to-save-welsh-hobbit-house-from-demolition

If you had the time to say a word or raise your hand in their favor it might help.  I live in the west of Ireland. I don’t know the people at all and have no interest in the matter other than that I feel their pain and if they lived somewhere else they would have gotten away with it.

Thank you for your time,

best regards,

Conor

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New Video of Our Homestead by Kirsten Dirksen, Fair Companies

May 18, 2015 at 9:03 pm

Kirsten Dirksen is a filmmaker with Fair Companies, a bi-lingual media operation that she and her husband Nicolás Boullosa run out of Barcelona. Kirsten is a former TV producer for MTV and the Travel Channel who now focusses on “…community and access to tools on sustainable culture.”

She has produced almost 600 videos, an amazing body of work when you consider that it’s the editing, not the shooting, that is so time-consuming. I don’t know how she does it.

We’ve had a bunch of people shoot film (OK, OK, video) around here and they generally take a long time to get set up, then follow a pre-conceived series of shots and questions.

Kirsten walked in the first time and within 5 minutes, was shooting. We were comfortable with her. She winged it, seeing what we were doing, following us around. On one of her visits, her two little long-haired girls explored the garden and chickens and Nicolás shot photos.

One thing I love about this video is that she recognized what Lesley is doing in her life and with her garden, her art, and her attitude towards a home. Often that gets missed in people coming here to see me.

The last part of this cracked me up.

Kirsten posted it earlier today.

https://faircompanies.com/videos/view/lloyd-kahn-on-his-norcal-self-reliant-half-acre-homestead/

Check through the other films at Fair Companies.

Photo of Kirsten by Nicolás Boullosa 

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The Barefoot Farmer grows more than food

March 3, 2015 at 11:30 am

“Take a trip to Jeff Poppen’s Long Hungry Creek Farm and you’ll find a year-round farm. You’re also likely to stumble across some agricultural teaching moments or discover yourself in the middle of a 1,000-person celebration. And it’s possible you’ll find all of that occurring simultaneously.

 Poppen, known to many as the Barefoot Farmer, uses his land to grow and raise food like plenty of other farmers do. But much more happens around his 250 acres in Red Boiling Springs, Tennessee, and most of it centers around Poppen’s many passions — a passion for small family farms, for community, for getting young people back on the land, and for healing the environment.…”

https://www.mnn.com/leaderboard/stories/the-barefoot-farmer-grows-more-than-food

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