Author: Andrea Cordonier
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Grandma Craft On Acid
Don’t like your current home or apartment? Then crochet yourself a new one! New York artist Agata Oleksiak has crocheted fitted coverings for EVERY object in her “apartment”, including the real (but inoperable) sink, telephone, tv, walls and the clawfoot tub and hairdryer I’m demoing above. She incorporates text messages into her wall hangings, transforming… Read more
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Building Model: Bensonwood Homes
According to New Hampshire builder Tedd Benson of Bensonwood Homes “we have a crisis of entanglement in our buildings.” In this 2010 video presentation to the College of the Atlantic, Benson discusses his Open-Built® Strategy for creating sustainable housing, and other buildings, that he expects to last several hundred years. Thanks to Andy C at… Read more
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Bananas, Like Mr. Lovins
About ten years ago a foodie friend of mine from the south of France accused me and my fellow Canadians of being the heaviest energy users in the world. (Not exactly true and a tricky calculation at best – see http://earthtrends.wri.org.) It was early April and we were taking a picnic in the hills above… Read more
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Nowhere to Go But Up
I am always left a little breathless when Mr. Fredericksson’s house lifts into the air with the aid of a million or so jellybean-coloured balloons. Read more
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Dust to Dust
What better day than a Sunday for some early morning reflection on our corporeal deficiencies and the fleeting nature of our built legacy? Take it away Percy Bysshe. Ozymandias I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,… Read more
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Un-Done
Just as some guys don’t remove their facial hair during hockey playoffs, I decided not to wash my work jeans until my final energy audit was complete. Like a talisman, I slipped on those pants day after day – ragged, stained and holey – until they could almost walk by themselves. Today they’re headed for… Read more
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The Trades As Art
Somewhere in the mid-20th century working with one’s hands lost its caché. As machines produced more and people less, it became déclassé to work as a tradesperson; the trades became a perceived dumping ground for those who lacked the capacity to reach a higher socio-economic level. About the same time, a great many people were… Read more
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Thirty-Eight Years On
Neither a wise man nor a brave man lies down on the tracks of history to wait for the train of the future to run over him. ~Dwight D. Eisenhower A few years ago as my career jump was informing itself, I came across a yellowing black and white magazine-style… Read more
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Between a Rock and a Fireplace
Evidently a geologist-type owned Old Gal sometime before us and felt inspired to face the brick fireplace with his collection of semi-precious rocks and stones. It wasn’t just the out-of-square placing of the crazy stones that bugged me, but the fact that it protruded from the walls by ten inches and was just, well, so… Read more