January 2012
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Lessons From the Front Lines of Social Design by... →
Another timely and relevant article exploring where and how social design fits. This one, however, is by a friend. How cool is that? There’s a shoutout to Epicenter, too (friends of Community Rebuilds). Double cool.
(via Design Observer)
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52 books in 52 weeks
In my internet wanderings (more frequent than actual wanderings, these days, although I did just get back from a lovely little jaunt to Wyoming) I stumbled across this guy’s blog. Among the various projects and adventures that Andrew Hyde tackles, and subsequently writes about, was a challenge to read 52 books in as many weeks. I’ve been looking for a catalyst of sorts, something to...
November 2011
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Interning to Do Good →
Another recent article on the discord between the powerful relevance and potential of architecture as a public service, and the antiquated licensing process. (via Metropolis)
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John Cary strikes again →
“…Imagine if graduates didn’t have to decide between devoting their formative years to serving the public, for example, and obtaining their license. Virtually every leader of the growing public-interest design movement made that difficult choice, and the public is better off for it, but the profession is missing out — disassociated from their extraordinary work. Further broadening the...
October 2011
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Why Architecture's Identity Problem Should Matter... →
Perhaps it was the Legos, or watching Mike Brady belly up to his drafting board on TV. In recent months and years, the likes of President Obama, Brad Pitt, Lenny Kravitz, and numerous other public figures have divulged a love of architecture, going so far as to say they once—or still—wanted to be architects. They, like so many of us, have a romantic view of the architecture world.
It makes...
July 2011
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June 2011
2 posts
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Christina Bikes America. Again.: June 6 →
Miss you, little girl…You brought joy to so many lives.
christinagenco:
In spite of the way the tragic way that the day ended, I think that it is important for people to know that Christina’s last day with us was really a great day for her. I know that I have included a lot more detail than she normally included in her blog, but I just want everyone to know as much…
April 2011
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In Remembrance
Ross A. Alameddine Christopher James Bishop Brian R. Bluhm Ryan Christopher Clark Austin Michelle Cloyd Jocelyne Couture-Nowak Kevin P. Granata Matthew Gregory Gwaltney Caitlin Millar Hammaren Jeremy Michael Herbstritt Rachael Elizabeth Hill Emily Jane Hilscher Jarrett Lee Lane Matthew Joseph La Porte Henry J. Lee Liviu Librescu G.V. Loganathan Partahi Mamora Halomoan Lumbantoruan Lauren Ashley...
March 2011
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Watch15:38 “…and when this happened, back then, people knew It for what It was, you know—they called It by Its name. They would put their hands together and they would start to chant, ‘Allah, Allah, Allah. God, God, God—that’s God.” -Elizabeth Gilbert
“Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or...”
– Jim Jarmusch
November 2010
1 post
October 2010
3 posts
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Watch
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Oct 4: World Habitat Day →
epicenter:
The United Nations has designated the first Monday in October as annual World Habitat Day. World Habitat Day 2010 will be held on October 4. World Habitat Day’s purpose is to call attention to the current global state of the human habitat and push toward adequate housing for all. We hope that by raising awareness and advocating for universal decent housing we can dismantle and...
August 2010
3 posts
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August Update
Hi, Strangers! Finally, we are putting the “straw” in “straw bale.” The fall semester is in full swing and the new students are well into the wall-raising portion of the build. There are some great shots of the bales arriving and the whole process, check them out on the Community Rebuilds Facebook page (you don’t need to have Facebook to see the pictures). August...
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How to make Smart Growth affordable →
What if mortgage lenders took into account the potential financial benefits of living in compact, mixed-used neighborhoods? Homeowners who spend less on gasoline — or don’t even own a car — have more money left for their housing payments. That should make them more attractive bets for lenders. (via GOOD)
July 2010
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WatchToday’s headline, Utah’s latest hero
…Apparently, two students at the University of Utah didn’t like that this homeowner was watering his lawn in a desert climate, so they started smashing his sprinklers…(via KSL news)
While I can’t condone these students’ method of action, I can vouch for my own sense of bewilderment observing some of the water usage...
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Open your eyes to reality around you →
In her essay “Seeing,” Annie Dillard tells an anecdote of newly sighted patients, blind from birth, who have had cataract operations that restored their sight. .. (via collegiate times)
June 2010
3 posts
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Natural disasters: how can we improve? →
Panel discussion with Martin Bell OBE, Dame Barbara Stocking (Oxfam GB) & Cameron Sinclair (Architecture for Humanity) May 25, 2010 Royal Geographic Society, 1 Kensington Gore, London
Architects, surveyors and planners are often at a loss in terms of how to gear their practice towards aid…The key is in balancing immediate humanitarian concerns with the potential for economic stability...
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de Botton: on making architecture accessible →
[Alain] de Botton claims that he has struggled with “our low expectations of architecture”, the fact that people…have grown used to living with poor quality construction, believing that the best building was in the past and that anything new was somehow threatening or soulless… (via ArchNewsNow)
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June Update
Hello friends,
Just checking in. I’m recently returned to the Red Rock from a couple of wonderfully relaxing weeks on the East Coast. The time was mostly filled with graduations and birthday celebrations (congratulations Tim, Corrie, and Jessie!) but other highlights include watching Jamie play soccer, jaunts to the city for crabcakes and Natty Boh, the requisite day at the Yard...
May 2010
4 posts
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Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front
A customer at the bookstore shared this with me tonight
by Wendell Berry
Love the quick profit, the annual raise, vacation with pay. Want more of everything ready-made. Be afraid to know your neighbors and to die. And you will have a window in your head. Not even your future will be a mystery any more. Your mind will be punched in a card and shut away in a little drawer. When they want you to...
April 2010
4 posts
“It is dire poverty indeed when a man is so malnourished and fatigued that he...”
– Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
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Episode 5
Hello hello!
It’s been a month since we’ve talked…so little has happened, and so much!
At the beginning of March we were still waiting for the USDA Rural Development loan to close so that we could begin demolition of the existing trailer on our site. For review, our program targets pre-1976 trailer homes as our first priority to replace with energy-efficient strawbale. This...
“If I were asked to say what is at once the most important production of Art and...”
– William Morris
March 2010
3 posts
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The Washington Post: Affordable housing needs some... →
Fairfax County aspires to greatly increase the amount of affordable housing at Tysons Corner for workers who now must commute there from afar, consuming time and fossil fuel while contributing to traffic congestion. But this newspaper reported recently that achieving Tysons’s affordable housing goals appears to be an economic non-starter…
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Episode 4
Tomorrow is Ground Break Day!!
Sort of.
Tomorrow we are hosting the USDA (meaning a whole lot of people that work there), local leaders, and visiting designers from Form Tomorrow for a non-profit strawbale day, of sorts. We’ll kick off with a presentation on strawbale and earth plasters by Laura Bartels and our very own Doni Kiffmeyer, followed by lunch at the lovely Red Rock Bakery and...
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February 2010
7 posts
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“…the average plastic fork is only used for three minutes before it’s...”
– Read more.
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make bombs of love →
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Episode 3
Hello again!
Believe it or not the fact that most of you are currently snowed in under 2 feet (and counting!) of snow has made me a tiny bit homesick…we got a light dusting overnight and it’s already been washed away. Of course here the snow only delays our ground-break date (March 1 should be the latest that we begin). One of my housemates, Hunter, posed the question this week,...
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the roots of urban homesteading →
a disarmingly relevant article from three decades past
A hundred years ago, “go west, young man” was good advice .. . after all, the western sky was big and clear, and land was free for the taking…
January 2010
2 posts
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Week One
Hello hello,
It’s the end of my first full week with Community Rebuilds.
When we arrived here, we were greeted almost universally with apologies for the extreme cold. Had we not been informed, most of us East Coasters and Midwesterners would have assumed that the near-freezing temperatures were normal for this time of year. Apparantly in Moab this is not the case. Due to...
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Hi from UTAH
Hi hi!
As you may or may not know, I have recently (temporarily) relocated to Moab, Utah, to work with an affordable housing group called Community Rebuilds. Like Habitat for Humanity, Community Rebuilds is committed to providing decent, safe, affordable housing to low-income families. Specifically, we work to replace pre-1976 trailer homes with energy-efficient naturally constructed (i.e....
November 2009
1 post
“all that is gold does not glitter, not all those who wander are lost.”
– j.r.r. tolkien