We’re scrambling to get ready to do our first festival appearance in four years.

Evan and I are in the process of packing up our trucks with all our festival gear: 10′ × 10′ booth with white canvas roof, our Shelter banner, boxes of books, tables, chairs, and lath walls that we will affix to the sides of the booth and upon which we will mount blowups from our various books.

This is for the Tiny Home Festival at the Alameda Fairgrounds in Pleasanton, California this weekend, September 10-11. Details and tickets at:
www.tinyfest.events/tinyfest-pleasanton-california-2022.

We will be selling our books at a discount and I will be doing a presentation and slideshow on Rolling Homes on the main stage at 1 PM on Saturday, September 10 (calendar file).

In the past we have appeared at green festivals, solar energy festivals, and what was the best of all: the Maker Faires, but the Maker Faires unfortunately went out of business, and then Covid came along.

The big news right now is that Rolling Homes is finally in the stores, as well as available from us via mail order.

Below are some spreads from Rolling Homes (available at shelterpub.com/building/rolling-homes, which has a 30% discount on two or more books and free shipping:

Read More …

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

One of the moments that makes all the stress of travel worthwhile.

Waiting for the ferry to Sicily, this guy in a kind of beat up car in front of me was repacking his stuff, and pulled this out.

I went over and we were able to converse in Spanish. I told him how great they were and gave him one of our mini books.

He had driven to Barcelona with a bunch of these little constructions to sell, but hadn’t sold any. Price, about 50 Euros (cheap!).

Native Siciliano, Marco Paderni, from Catania.

Then he took out a 2nd smaller one (second pic), pointed to it and said “Regalo” — gift. I thanked him, but demurred, referring to air travel.

What generosity! Isn’t it strange how people with the least resources are the most generous?

• From @lloyd.kahn’s Instagram

I’ve admired this little floating building for years, on a local bay.

This design could be adapted to living quarters. Barbecue, beer and tables out on deck. Winch to haul boat out of water. No rent.

Brilliant design often happens in unexpected places. I find a lot of it with farm buildings.

Architecture without architects.