It’s time for an update on building our house because things have been moving along swiftly this winter. Last summer we went over our 44 acres with Roald Gundersen and Della Hansmann from Whole Trees Architecture, selecting specific trees to be part of the house based on both their suitability […]
Acoustic tomography. Ever heard of it? This is a nondestructive imaging technique to determine what’s going on inside a tree. According to “Evaluation of Acoustic Tomography for Tree Decay Detection,” internal decay is an ever-present possibility which seriously compromises lumber production. For every 100 million board feet of timber […]
A crew from Whole Trees Architecture and Construction spent Tuesday and Wednesday on our land and completed peeling all the trees that need peeling this summer to serve as the unmilled timbers we will be using to build our house next spring. Selected not only because they are the right […]
We had a peeling party on our land this week. Monday through Wednesday there were from six to nine people selecting and prepping the trees that will hold up the house we build next summer. On Monday most of the trees were selected from our 44 acres. (See The First […]
Today was an exciting day. Doug and I cleared overgrown trails and created new ones for the past few days so that today we could walk our woods with Roald Gundersen of Whole Trees Architecture and Construction and with his assistant Della Hansmann, who is designing our house. We were […]
We have been drawing up plans for our house for years, but putting a sod roof on our house is a new idea to me. My architects (Whole Tree Architecture) are comfortable with sod roofs. They have made several houses with a sod roof. Their studio has one. I have […]
We are edging closer and closer to a final plan for our sustainable, little house to be built next summer. We have worked out a plan that is cozy and ship shape. We have visited and seen photos of a number of Whole Tree Architecture Houses. I’m starting to develop […]
When you are building a non-traditional house, you spend a lot of time wondering about things that people building in the usual 2×4, drywall, aluminum siding and asphalt shingle world can take for granted. But Doug and I want to be green pioneers and explore new ideas about sustainable structures. […]
I just had an article published in Odyssey Magazine this month. This is a very cool, science magazine for middle school kids that I have loved for a long time. Each issue has a theme, and April’s theme is trees. I wrote a piece about how whole tree building can […]
In 2012 we will build a dwelling place on our land. We are working with Whole Trees Architecture and Construction on drawing up plans to design a structure built of locally grown (many grown on our own property), unmilled timbers. These won’t be the best “specimen” trees around. Instead they’ll […]
Digging in the Driftless 