New Cordwood Website & Blog

Would you like to check out our new Cordwood Construction Website & Blog?  It is easy to navigate, filled with beautiful pictures, videos, instructional posts, books, plans & links.  Go to https://cordwoodconstruction.org/cordwood-timber-framed-sauna-in-michigan and have a “click around.”  If you’d like, please sign up to subscribe to the new blog. FYI, all NEW blog posts will be posted at this new site.  Want to learn about the Top Ten Best Practices to make your building warm and energy efficient (or cool and energy efficient)? 

How about a cozy place by the fire?Thinking about an Off-Grid cordwood cabin? 

Want to build a sauna that doubles as a guest cottage? How about a cordwood castle?

Or a hybrid cordwood cottage?Million dollar cordwood lodge.16 sided cordwood home?

Want to create a cordwood work of art for your community?Whatever your cordwood ideas; on this new site, you will find detailed information so you can proceed with confidence. Visit https://cordwoodconstruction.org to explore all your options.

25 Cordwood Homes: Beauty Inside & Out

Inside and Out:  When I post a cordwood photo, folks often ask, “What does that look like on the inside?  This is a 4 part blog post series about incredible cordwood homes, cabins, and cottages with pictures of the outside and the inside. Bryan & Lois Pratt built this unbelievably gorgeous cordwood home in Woodland Park, Colorado. It is 12 sided with a full post and beam log framework. This is a masterpiece of good construction and design.  The back windows and deck look out onto Pike’s Peak!The kitchen at the Pratt’s home is a lovely place for a healthy meal. Albert Norris built this beautiful cordwood cabin with double doors in Alberta, Canada.

Cordwood and blue windows with bottle bricks in Alberta, Canada. Double Wall with 4.3 KW array in LaCrescent, Minnesota by Alan Stankevitz.

Nick Kautzer post frame and cordwood in California.

 

Oklahoma cordwood using red cedar and bottles to make a cozy family room. Washington State cordwood with Western Red Cedar.Vancouver Island cordwood home with a fish pond.

Spartanburg, South Carolina with a spiral staircase and a basement. Asheville, North Carolina, cordwood on a mountain top.Cordwood home at White Earth in Minnesota made of cedar, with a room in the attic truss for an additional 800 sq. ft. of living space. 

The Cordwood Education Center Classroom in Merrill, Wisconsin.

Northern White Cedar cordwood home in Reedsburg, WI.  Don & Cathy.Flatau’s Chateau lovely cordwood home in Merrill, Wisconsin (above and below).

The Cordstead in Quebec: a BnB by Sandy and Angelika. 

Sebastien Demers and his round and rectangle cordwood home in Quebec City, Quebec.His banana tree produced 30 pounds of bananas!Kinstone Cordwood Chapel in the springtime. John Meilahn, Copper Harbor, Michigan. Should you wish to learn how to build a cordwood cottage, cabin or home, please visit www.cordwoodconstruction.org   While you are there, click on the pictures, read the brief articles, check out the latest workshops and newsletter and if you are interested click on the Online Bookstore to see all the cordwood literature available in print and ebook format.If you have questions that aren’t answered on the website you can email me at richardflatau@gmail.com  

Readers have requested a brief bio, so here goes:

Richard & Becky Flatau built their mortgage-free cordwood home in 1979 in Merrill, Wisconsin. Since then, they have written books, conducted workshops, facilitated the 2005,  2011 and 2015 Cordwood Conferences and provided consultation for cordwood builders.  Cordwood Workshop DVD (2018),  Cordwood Construction Best Practices (print 2017) and Cordwood Conference Papers 2015 are the newest publications available from their Online Cordwood Bookstore.  The books & DVD are also available as ebooks for a quick and easy shipping free download.   www.cordwoodconstruction.org

This is the Cordwood Workshop DVD will show you how to build a best practices cordwood home.

The 30 detailed menu items from the Cordwood Workshop DVD.

Thank you for your kind attention to Cordwood Construction.   If you would like more information, please visit www.cordwoodconstruction.org

Or email richardflatau@gmail.com 

 

 

Cordwood Window Boxes: How to build

Making a well built window box (also called window buck) for your cordwood home is crucial.  Done properly your windows will open and close with ease in perpetuity.  There are a couple of important points to follow.

1.  Buy your windows first so you can make the right size window box. 
2.  Make the window box out of dimensional lumber for added strength adding 1/4″ to each side (called the rough opening).  Have windows of all the same size:  make a template like in the picture above. 
3.  Secure the window box to a post, top plate, lintel or framework.  
4.  Brace the window box diagonally so it stays square, level and plumb.
5. Stack your windows safely out of the elements and then install carefully to keep them level on the outside of the window box.  If they come with a nailing flange, make sure it is nailed securely to the outside edge of the box. 
6. It is possible to float small windows into a cordwood wall.

7. More photos of well built and well installed window boxes.

8. These tips  work for all natural building styles.

9. Door frames and window boxes attached and ready for cordwood infill.

Should you wish to learn how to build a cordwood cottage, cabin or home, please visit www.cordwoodconstruction.org   While you are there, click on the pictures, read the brief articles, check out the latest workshops and newsletter and if you are interested click on the Online Bookstore to see all the cordwood literature available in print and ebook format.If you have questions that aren’t answered on the website you can email me at richardflatau@gmail.com  

Readers have requested a brief bio, so here goes:   Richard & Becky Flatau built their mortgage-free cordwood home in 1979 in Merrill, Wisconsin. Since then, they have written books, conducted workshops, facilitated the 2005,  2011 and 2015 Cordwood Conferences and provided instruction for thousands of cordwood builders.  Cordwood Workshop Video (2017),  Cordwood Construction Best Practices (2017) and Cordwood Conference Papers 2015 are the newest publications available from their online cordwood bookstore.   www.cordwoodconstruction.org

Here is a picture of the Cordwood Workshop Video cover, featuring the Cordwood Education Center.

For more information on Cordwood Construction, click on the picture or visit www.cordwoodconstruction.org   Below is the 30 item Video menu. 

 

Oldest Cordwood in the world?

Did the Pueblo build cordwood houses?  It looks like they did.  Archeological research indicated they used petrified wood and clay.  This is called the Agate House and is located at the Petrified Forest National Park in NE Arizona.The petrified wood is 200 million years old and the trees grew hundreds of feet tall. They have petrified over time into very colorful agate.

Ancestral Puebloan people used petrified wood for a variety of purposes including tools such as projectile points, knives, and scrapers. Agate House demonstrates another innovative use of petrified wood: as a building material. The eight-room pueblo was built and occupied sometime between 1050 and 1300 in a location near agricultural fields and petrified wood deposits.

Agate House now stands alone on top of a small hill in Rainbow Forest, but it was likely part of a much larger community. Since its excavation in the 1930s, hundreds of similar petrified wood structure sites have been found in the park. Many date to the same time period (Pueblo II-Pueblo III). Though built using original materials, the 1930s reconstruction is not a completely accurate replication of the original structure. Still it enables us to envision the daily lives of people that called it home.The petrified wood is beautiful.  I guess it can be called cordwood even if the wood is 200 million years old :0)   A big thank you to the Klippel’s for finding and photographing this treasure on their way to the Grand Canyon!

Should you wish to learn how to build a cordwood cottage, cabin or home (in which to build your cordwood floor), please visit www.cordwoodconstruction.org   While you are there, click on the pictures, read the brief articles, check out the latest workshops and newsletter and if you are interested click on the Online Bookstore to see all the cordwood literature available in print and ebook format.If you have questions that aren’t answered on the website you can email me at richardflatau@gmail.com  

Readers have requested a brief bio, so here goes:

Richard & Becky Flatau built their mortgage-free cordwood home in 1979 in Merrill, Wisconsin. Since then, they have written books, conducted workshops, facilitated the 2005,  2011 and 2015 Cordwood Conferences and provided consultation for thousands of cordwood builders.  Cordwood Construction: Best Practices DVD,  Cordwood Construction Best Practices (print) and Cordwood Conference Papers 2015 are the newest publications available from their online cordwood bookstore.   www.cordwoodconstruction.org

Here is a picture of the Cordwood Workshop Video cover, featuring the Cordwood Education Center.

For more information on Cordwood Construction, click on the picture or visit www.cordwoodconstruction.org   Below is the 30 item Video menu. 

Cordwood Sauna Workshop

We had the distinct pleasure of teaching a Post & Beam Framing Workshop and a Cordwood Workshop at Kinstone Permaculture Academy on June 12-15, 2014.  The students were wonderful, energetic and full of ideas.   We used the first two days to frame the Cordwood Sauna.

This is a 12′ x 16′ sauna that is next to the camping facilities and solar showers at Kinstone. Here the students are learning to frame a building and keep it level & plumb.

Damp proof rolled roofing is in place (to stop water migration) and the first post is being leveled and anchored.   Holes are drilled in the foundation and 3/8″ angle iron, anchor sleeves and lag screws are added to keep the building from going anywhere.

It is important to have “many hands on deck” to keep these large 8″ x 8″ girders in a secure place.

Students had an opportunity to learn how to use power tools safely with instruction and supervision. Many students shared their expertise.

Hurricane straps are important to secure the top rafters from wind shear.

Discussing and learning to “problem solve” on a job site is one of the many advantages of taking a workshop.

The framing is now ready for cordwood infill.

The first step in cordwooding, is learning how to prepare and use a proper mortar.  The bandana’s are fashionable dust masks.

Many hands make light work:0)

The first row is the most important!

Folks are happy when they learn the proper techniques.

Tuck pointing is a learned art.  Rubber gloves are important to keep the hands safe.

Learning to install a recycled bottle for a “stained glass” effect.

It was supposed to rain on the last day, but the rain held-off and we were able to get quite a bit of work completed.

The building is now ready for the next workshop.

The finished product.  Ready for some heat!

If you are interested please go to www.cordwoodconstruction.org and click on the Workshop links on the right side of the page.

For information, photos, articles and books on Cordwood Construction, go to  www.facebook.com/cordwoodconstruction    http://cordwoodconstruction.org/  if you are interested in books, ebooks, DVD’s check out the Online bookstore 

Want to take a workshop from the comfort of your own home?  This DVD is for you.

If you have any questions please leave a comment or email me at richardflatau@gmail.com