Living Earth Structures

Miguel Elliot, a Petaluma, Calif. native, specializes in creating various living earth structures such as cob benches, cob ovens, adobe dome saunas and small huts: http://www.livingearthstructures.com, 707-320-3609

Thatched Roofs Orkney Islands, UK

After my September posting "Dry-wall Stone Beehive Hut in Ireland," an anonymous reader wrote to tell me about the scarcity of wood in some parts of the UK (the beehive huts were all stone, no wood), and sent a link to an article titled "Thatch Traditions in Orkney Farm Buildings." It's a detailed account of construction of wood-framed thatched roofs in the Orkney Islands: http://bit.ly/3TmkQT

Yesterday's Adventures: Little House/'55 Olds 98/Dueling Deer/Running in the Rain

Question: where is this little house? Costa Rica? Hawaii? Mexico? Nope. It's on 5th Street in Berkeley, near our distributor's (Publishers Group West) office on 4th Street. It's a nice little unassuming neighborhood of modest small houses, adjacent to an industrial area and the train tracks. Of course as you head up toward the University of California campus, the neighborhoods and houses get more elegant and expensive.

In the cars-you-gotta-love department, this 1955 Oldsmobile 98 parked in San Rafael yesterday afternoon. I was 20 years old when this rolled off the assembly line. Check out the twin tear-drop spotlights; I had a pair on my '46 Chevy sedan. Oh, don't get me started talking about '40s & '50s cars!

Then around 6PM I was driving to meet my running friends, it was pitch black and cold. I was coming along the creek in Frank's Valley and here smack in the middle of the road were two big buck mule deer, squared off with horns locked, duking it out. They were oblivious to me and my headlights. They were pushing against each other, antlers clacking. Finally one pushed the other across the road and the loser ran up the bank. What a vision! I pictured a demure doe, brown eyed with long eyelashes awaiting the outcome, and about to take off with the Big Guy and perpetuate the species with good genes.

I'm running alone these days, until I get up to speed to run with the boys, so I took off along the coast, climbing up on the coastal trail with my strap-on headlight. It was raining lightly: I love running in the rain—once you get warmed up, it's glorious. The air was fresh and the ocean sweet-smelling. When I got to the lookout point, about 1000 feet above the ocean, I could see the lights of 8 crab boats; the season has just opened, and it looks like a good one, and the bigger boats pull their crab pots at night.

Our Green Festival Booth Sunday

Our booth was mobbed for a couple of hours on Saturday and then Sunday.I took this shot during a lull. We sold tons of books, and probably more importantly, gave out 400 Builders of the Pacific Coastt posters as well as about 1200 of our (small, 4-color) catalogs. Personal word-of-mouth publicity with ink on paper (posters, catalogs) in the electronic age.
Dozens of people came up and thanked me for the books over the years. Wow! The 60-year-olds invariably picked up Shelter, said they had a beat-up old copy, and reminisced about the '60s; the 40-year-olds said, "My Dad had this book, and I used to look through it…" The 20-30-year olds had just discovered either Home Work or Shelter, and were excited to see such things going on in the world. It seems like we're rapidly rebuilding a network of builders, gardeners, and homemakers. (We had such a network in the Whole Earth Catalog days, but it dissipated.) The feedback is wonderful. These people understand the books.

Three-Year-Old Real Goods Stockholder at SF Green Festival

This little guy was checking out the booth next to ours yesterday. (On lower left are the free Builders of the Pacific Coast posters we were giving out.)

Crests on Traditional Japanese Clothing

This is a link to a blog posting about a house in Gojo, Japan designed by architects Eastern Design Office for an artist, described on the blog as "…a traditional craftsman who puts the crest on Japanese traditional clothes." There are a bunch of photos of the concrete house, with its repeating circular motifs, and this display of some of the artist's crests (applied by hand to each garment). http://bit.ly/2nCGgK

Rainy Morning San Francisco

Went to a wonderful Leonard Cohen concert last night. It was the last stop on his current tour and had a feeling of finality, like maybe his last tour. Packed arena, and as the evening went on, there was a glow between LC and audience. They LOVED him, and it showed, and he responded. He has such a powerful suite of songs, a cooking 6-piece band of virtuosos, and a dream team trio of backup singers. Unique.
I'm writing this from a cool little cafe, with barista latte and free wi-fi, the Cafe Bean, 800 Sutter, checking my mail, getting ready to go over to the Green Festival. This fortune teller painting is just down the block.

Our Booth at Green Festival

Lew and I are getting pretty fast at setting up. This was the day before the event opened, and we hadn't put our tablecloths on or our books out.

Graffiti in San Francisco Alley

In an alley around 14th and Valencia this morning on my way to the Green festival

Opposite House—Glass-box Boutique Hotel in China

There ARE good architects at work here and there in the world. This spiffy (and expensive) hotel was "…designed by the Japanese master of transparent buildings Kengo Kuma…" Further: "…The hotel's basement, packed with quality food and drink …has already become a crucial new destination for hip locals.… Bei serves both sushi and duck in a smart, modernist interior that pays homage to nature. At night, the basement becomes an epicenter for a stylish younger crowd thanks to the dance-friendly bar, Punk, which flows seamlessly to the basement landing offering a glimpse of the luminous 22-meter stainless-steel swimming pool."
I just ran across this at Ritual Roasters uber-coffee house in San Francisco, am on my way to set up our booth at the SF Green Festival. It was on a pretty cool website, goodhunting.com

Childrens Activity and Learning Centre at Thai Hotel

Childrens' center at the hotel resort Soneva Kiri on Koh Kood, an island in the Gulf of Thailand.
Architects: 24h > Architecture, Habita Architects
Programs: Auditorium/Cinema, Library, Art Room, Music Room, Fashion Room, Balcony and slide
Constructed Area: 165 sqm
Design Year: 2006 - 2007
Construction Year: 2008 - 2009
Photographs: Kiattipong Panchee and Boris Zeisser
http://bit.ly/3Jjp4Z

Last of the original Minis

I was walking down the sidewalk in Kenmare, Co. Kerry, in the morning (Sept. 23), and this guy came across the street, singing to his little girl (see her peeking through the window here). The Mini was his and I asked him about it (we have a Mini Cooper these days, and I used to rent these wonderful little cars in England and Ireland in the '70s). He said they made Minis up until 2001 (!) and you can tell the last production runs from the silver stripes.

Muckross Venture Center

This building was on the road going into Killarney, County Kerry. Don't know its history, but it's now used as a youth center.

Dry-wall Stone Beehive Hut in Ireland

I'm going through all my photos shot in Europe and will post a few from time to time. I could do a book on just this trip, but more pressing is to begin work (next month) on our new book on tiny houses. (We got content!)
This beehive hut is on the Dingle Peninsula, County Kerry, on the southwest coast of Ireland. No mortar. A beehive hut is built in a circle of successive strata of stone; each stratum is a little closer to the center than the one beneath, and so on. At the top is a small aperture that's closed with a flagstone or capstone. They were built in the "early christian period," or around 200 AD, by farmers. Look at what you can do with just stone! (They are similar to the stone trulli of Puglia, Italy.)
It was a sunny day, the grass vivid green, and we wandered on the hillside, where there were huts and stone corrals, all looking down on the sparkling blue Dingle Bay. If I may be allowed a "woo-woo" moment here, I felt as if I'd been there before. It felt so familiar, so peaceful, so right.

Spectacular Cliffside House

I just ran across 13 photos of this house in Buchupureo, Chile and is the product of owners and architects Alvaro Ramirez and Clarisa Elton. Thanks to noah for info on location and owners.http://bit.ly/1hF5x2

Dutch Village With No Roads

A village in Holland with no roads. All transportation by boats, paths and bridges. http://www.manyholes.com/2009/09/fwd-roadless-village-at-holland/

Huge Treehouse in Crossville, Tennessee

Photo by Chuck Sutherland on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/chucksutherland/3977773445/

Great Blues Videos

Blues fans, trust me:http://myhouseofblues.com Jeez, I can't get any work done this morning since Lew sent me this website. Right now listening to a bit of guitar heaven, BB King, Eric Clapton and BUDDY GUY doing "Rock Me baby."

Composting Toilet on Lasqueti Island

Open-air composting toilet built by Birchbarkbobananda out of cedar in British Columbia, he calls it "crap-cedral." This photo taken by his Estonian friends is at: http://bit.ly/4cCuAf
Birchbarkbobananda is a world traveler with bike and sleeping bag, last heard of sailing the Baltics with an Iranian adventurer, building a "free low tech hot tub…". His postings at: http://bit.ly/1sKi8i
Photo sent us by Godfrey Stephens. Check out Godfrey's amazing carvings and paintings at: http://www.godfreystephens.com

Al Whittle, Architectural Illustrator in UK

Al Whittle is an architectural detailer and illustrator who, with Jenny Broome, run Element Detailing Limited, a small company based in the East Midlands in the United Kingdom. In an era when architects are in general more proficient with CAD programs than pen-and-ink illustration, Al's drawings can help architects and builders visualize their projects. His drawings are really nice. Their studio is timber frame with strawbale walls and a sedum roof. http://www.elementdetailing.com/Site/Welcome.html
This sketch is a detail for a bat lantern roost situated on top of a sedum roof.