the incredible building mash-up

We’ve been thinking about what to build next. The Noah House has settled into daily usage. The landscaping projects are slowing down as winter approaches. And we seem to have a tradition of starting new buildings in January. Which means we’re in the imagining stages, now, for the next one.

Next one, you say? Well, yes. We seem to be building a house, room by room, where none of the rooms actually touch each other. And while we’re comfortable now, the kids are growing. They’ll need more space before we can blink. Time to get a head start on that.

This summer we visited a friend who has a large, two-story house, of the totally normal variety, and the kids were amazed. “Mom! Look at this! All the rooms are connected to each other!” They thought the indoor staircase was particularly wondrous. I guess whatever you’ve got is the standard upon which everything else is judged, right? It was pretty funny. “Mom, they have a bathroom inside their house! Did you see this?”

So, for our next building, we’re in the question stages. We’re asking ourselves, Where would we like another room? Off in the woods? Or close to the yurt? We’re asking, To what purpose would this room most likely be put, both short-term, and long-term? We’re asking, what materials do we have to build with? And what materials would we like to play with?

Luc has made strong claims on the next room. He says he needs a place for his puzzles where he can leave them all out and no one will walk on them. Sounds good to me. So, if it’s going to be a Luc room, it will probably need to be close to the yurt, because he’s a little guy still. And Paul has a line on some stone and is talking about how he would like to do some more masonry. He enjoyed doing the stonework for his tool shed. Only he’s nervous about doing corners…so I suggested making it round. No corners and a curved wall is stronger anyway, right? Maybe with a living roof…?

Do we want a round, stone, room, close to the yurt, for Luc and his puzzles? Would a room like that still be valuable to him in five years? Ten years, when he’s a teen-ager? What if he grows to be a big six-foot guy?

And what about how such a structure would fit with the flow of the structures that already exist? Or with the structures we might build in the future?

And if Luc doesn’t want that room later, who might use it then? And for what? Can we made allowances for that in the design now? Maybe further into the woods would be better after all…?

I love this part of building, all in the mind, tossing ideas around, the structure effortlessly morphing, this way and that way, before our very eyes. The constraints are (1) available money, (2) size (relating to permitting, cost, length of time to build, etc), (3) materials, (4) our building ability, and (5) sometimes timing (if we’re in a rush, but we aren’t for this one, hooray!). But such constraints are like the rules that shape a sonnet. Sometimes, if you can do anything, you fall back on what you know and, maybe, pick a plan out of a book of plans. On the other hand, embracing a set of constraints can help push creativity, rather than limit it. Within these constraints, how can we get really specific about how this structure might serve us and make our lives more sparkly?

(Of course, it all changes once building actually commences. But the first ideas are the starting place, without which is nothing can commence at all.)

I really believe you can only get this kind of hands-on creativity in building if you are doing it yourself. But if you are doing it yourself, you can make a simple building into Art You Live In.

And it’s fun!