Creativity and Connection

I love things that are simultaneously functional, beautiful, sustainable, and help remind us of our connection to the world around us (both human and natural). In fact, for me, an object's beauty usually comes from its intersection with those other three attributes. That's the basis for our foray into edible landscapes. Thus, I was thrilled when, late last week, Richard sent me an inspiring New York Times article (11/4/09) about Roald Gundersen, a Wisconsin forester, architect and builder who creates passive solar homes, greenhouses, commercial buildings, and other structures from whole trees, rather than from milled lumber. 

I learned that building with a whole, unmilled tree is more frugal, more sustainable and can support 50 percent more weight than largest piece of lumber milled from the same tree. The brief online slide show accompanying the article led me to look up Gundersen's firm, Whole Trees Architecture and Construction, and blog (see The Log Blog, in blog list at right). Turns out that building with whole trees is also exquisitely beautiful, leading to human shelters that resonate with connections to the natural world.  Gundersen's wife and business partner, Amelia Baxter, a former urban farmer, community organizer and co-owner of the firm, manages a community forest project modeled after community-supported agriculture. Members can harvest firewood, foods like mushrooms and watercress, and building trees from the woods in ways that sustain forests them as living resources, rather than as raw material to be extracted and used up. 

The Whole Trees web site also offers a cool "tree word of the day." The day I looked it was "thigmomorphogenesis," which, I learned, refers to a tree's ability to strengthen in response to tactile stimuli (e.g., wind blowing against a trunk). 

 

In the past two years, we have been more actively managing the 6 wooded acres surrounding our house, selectively culling some trees so that others have a better chance to grow. Gundersen's work has me looking at the dead elm, small-diameter ash, and occasional cherry trees we have been taking down in new ways, thinking about what we might build next.