Lloyd, hello. I’m Tomas Lipps, used to live in Bolinas late ’70s, early ’80s… I was pleased to stumble upon your blog today and have enjoyed browsing through it. One line in particular struck me [referring to the book Shelter]: “We were both fans of Life Magazine, and felt that each two-page spread should stand alone and be visually balanced.” That’s because I’ve gotten into publishing myself. I edit a glossy print publication called STONEXUS Magazine and a digital counterpart to it called the STONEZINE, and in the print mag I’m particularly sensitive to how the two-page spreads are laid out. (The ‘zine is single-page, 8.5″ × 14″.)
Good to see you’re still at it, and out and about. I’ve been confined here in Santa Fe due to the damn pandemic, but as soon as I get issue #XX printed and mailed out (April), I’ll go off on the trip I had planned in 2020 — to Sardinia. Will be photographing stonework there, the Bronze Age Nuraghi in particular fascinate me. You seem to be familiar with Italy, anything you can tell me about Sardinia?
Tags: architecture, art, building, carpentry, design, green building, homestead, natural building, natural materials, natural world, nature, sauna, treehouse, trucks From our good friend yogan, a highly skilled and innovative carpenter in France:
Our last job!
A big tower in colombage (Middle Ages technique of half-timber framing).
We sawed the wood with a mobile horizontal bandsaw, then drew an outline of the entire tower on the floor of our workshop; we then laid the wood on the markings to draw the assemblage.
Only tenons and mortises! No nails or bolts.
It’s a 4.5 × 4.5 × 12 meter (15 by 15 by 40 feet) tower (without the rock foundation).
8.7m3 (94 sq. ft.) of oak and chestnut was used. Almost 18m3 (194 sq. ft.) of uncut logs.
The roof and the walls will be finished this year!
www.cabanophiles.com
yogan.over-blog.com
facebook.com/mryogan
instagram.com/yogancarpenter
Photo of Sámi people standing in front of a peat-covered goahti shelter around 1880 in Northern Norway
The Sámi people are a Finno-Ugric-speaking people inhabiting the region of Sápmi (formerly known as Lapland), which today encompasses large northern parts of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and of the Murmansk Oblast, Russia, most of the Kola Peninsula in particular. The Sámi have historically been known in English as Lapps or Laplanders, but these terms are regarded as offensive by some Sámi people, who prefer the area’s name in their own languages, e.g. Northern Sami Sápmi.…
Traditionally, the Sámi have pursued a variety of livelihoods, including coastal fishing, fur trapping, and sheep herding. Their best-known means of livelihood is semi-nomadic reindeer herding. Currently about 10% of the Sámi are connected to reindeer herding, which provides them with meat, fur, and transportation. 2,800 Sámi people are actively involved in reindeer herding on a full-time basis in Norway. For traditional, environmental, cultural, and political reasons, reindeer herding is legally reserved for only Sámi people in some regions of the Nordic countries.…
–Wikipedia
From article in The Guardian on the return of a Sámi shaman’s drum to the Sámi people by the National Museum of Denmark
Sent us by Maui Surfer
Handmade living structure built from invasive grass by Daren Rabinovitch on the Aptos, California homestead known as Trout Gulch, created by members of the animation company Encyclopedia Pictura.
Note: Sean Hellfritsch, who lived at Trout Farm for a while, commented that they could not keep the woodrats out of the building. (Makes sense, it looks like a giant woodrat nest.)
Link to the NPR story Jon did about the place:
www.npr.org/2011/07/17/137680605/making-cutting-edge-animation-on-a-diy-homestead
Hi Lloyd,
Love Shelter and ever since a friend showed me your book a decade ago I’ve been dreaming of taking a copy of it with me to a hillside somewhere in Europe and seeing what might be possible haha
I’ve done bits of labouring and landscaping and walling over the years here in Cornwall, and have never quite managed to earn and save up enough to get a foot on the ladder towards some land here or even elsewhere as life has been quite hectic. However, I somehow managed to come away with enough money to buy the old ruin I’d dreamed of since being 15.
It’s not on a hillside somewhere sunny yet, but that might be the next one, but it is a very special place in an incredibly beautiful and historic area within a world heritage site.
It was built in the late 1700s to early 1800s and the archaeologists that we have to use here in the preliminary stages of the build because of the surrounding ancient history even found a couple of shetland pony shoes (that were often used by the coast here to pull up carts full of seaweed). We also found an old pair of sugar tongs and a half penny from 1861 which was really cool.
From the patchy information that we’ve managed to find in some of the old records it’s likely that it was lived in by mining and agricultural workers as there is an ancient farm 100m down the track and many disused copper and tin mines scattered all over the fields and into the valley.
I’m probably only one third of the way through the works (with some help along the way) towards reinstating it traditionally and working it into a cosy tiny home that will sleep 2 to 3 and maybe even a couple more outside in a small yurt or something.
Read More …
Under the gaze of southern Arizona’s cinnamon-hued Canelo Hills, a mother shares ancient building traditions with her three sons. In Puebloan creation stories, adobe structures, like people, emerge from the earth and return to the earth. For Athena Steen, it’s the family memories, skills, knowledge, love, laughter — and the clay itself — that endure.
All clay, rock, and standing dead timber harvests in this film conducted in accordance with the rules of local jurisdictions.
Also, see: www.caneloproject.com/photos
From the multi-talented Steen family.
Hi Lloyd.
I thought you might be interested in this small shed, alone in a field up the valley from my home in Southern Snowdonia, Wales. We’re in an area of old slate mining which began in the mid-19th century. and finished maybe 30-40 years ago. The slate slabs on this small outbuilding are between one and two inches thick.
Cheers, and all the very best to you from Corris, Wales.
–Neil Heath
A month or so ago, I saw a unique elliptical wooden teardrop trailer in the surfers’ parking lot at Salmon Creek (Sonoma County). Inside was Mira Nussbaum, who was painting on a silk scarf. The trailer will be one of the units covered in our forthcoming book (publication date May-June, 2022), Rolling Homes. Mira told me she and her husband lived in a tiny home, and she sent these photos. A link to her art work is at www.silkstorymaps.com.
Our tiny house, Tree Song, was inspired by three years of visioning and design for a better way of life. We built this sanctuary so that we could take a step towards living our own beliefs and values in our day-to-day choices. Tree Song was built in 2010 from locally harvested and produced material sourced from local businesses who care about their ecological impact, furthering our intention to live a simple life connected to the land. Tree Song was built on a 22′ × 8′ trailer and is 13′ tall. This amazing home has been at two retreat centers on the East Coast, made an arduous cross-country journey, and now resides in Northern California where we have called it our home since 2017.
–Mira and Alex
