Lloyd Kahn, author of the counter culture classics Shelter and Home Work, presents his new book, Builders of the Pacific Coast, at Northtown Books on Friday, November 21st at 7 pm.
In 2004, Kahn discovered a group of unique carpenters along the Pacific Coast of North America. Over a two-year period, he made four trips north from his home in the San Francisco Bay Area, up the coast, shooting the hundreds of photos that appear in this book. Kahn was the shelter editor of The Whole Earth Catalog in the 60s and 70s, and has had a keen interest in the art and craft of handbuilt homes for several decades.
To preserve homeowners' privacy, specific locations are not given, but the book focuses on the Pacific Coast north from San Francisco up to and around Vancouver Island, British Columbia. A few of the homes are located here in Humboldt County.
There are three featured builders: the aptly named Lloyd House, master craftsman and designer who has created a series of unique homes on a small island; Bruno Atkey, builder of a number of houses and lodges built of hand-split cedar on "The Wild Coast" (the Pacific Ocean side of Vancouver Island), and SunRay Kelley, barefoot builder tuned into Nature, who has designed and built wildly imaginative structures in Washington, California, and other parts of the country.
In addition, the book features working homesteads, sculptural buildings of driftwood, live-aboard boats, gypsy-type caravans, and examples of stunning architectural design.
In 2004, Kahn discovered a group of unique carpenters along the Pacific Coast of North America. Over a two-year period, he made four trips north from his home in the San Francisco Bay Area, up the coast, shooting the hundreds of photos that appear in this book. Kahn was the shelter editor of The Whole Earth Catalog in the 60s and 70s, and has had a keen interest in the art and craft of handbuilt homes for several decades.
To preserve homeowners' privacy, specific locations are not given, but the book focuses on the Pacific Coast north from San Francisco up to and around Vancouver Island, British Columbia. A few of the homes are located here in Humboldt County.
There are three featured builders: the aptly named Lloyd House, master craftsman and designer who has created a series of unique homes on a small island; Bruno Atkey, builder of a number of houses and lodges built of hand-split cedar on "The Wild Coast" (the Pacific Ocean side of Vancouver Island), and SunRay Kelley, barefoot builder tuned into Nature, who has designed and built wildly imaginative structures in Washington, California, and other parts of the country.
In addition, the book features working homesteads, sculptural buildings of driftwood, live-aboard boats, gypsy-type caravans, and examples of stunning architectural design.
You don't just read this visual extravaganza of Lloyd Kahn's magnificent discoveries of the homebuilder's art and imagination in the hidden byways and buried inlets of the Pacific Northwest. You deep-breathe your way through its full-color page-spreads with mounting delight, excitement, nostalgia, and a deepening admiration for the diversity of the unfettered expression of the human spirit that the much-distorted 1960's inspired and allowed, and with a re-fired commitment not to let that spirit wither.
– Peter Nabokov
Check out Lloyd Kahn's interesting blog too.
UPDATE: We had a great turnout, and it seems Lloyd enjoyed his time here in Arcata too.
