Lughnasadh Sheltermaker

To join the Sheltermaker eMailing List, email sheltermaker @ gmail.com

I am at a most interesting place, literally living my own architecture. This is fascinating and a bit of a roller coaster. The EconoSpace Project has raised so many personal issues that I am stunned and fascinated at the same time. The resistance to progress has been so strong that it is demanding a complete reassessment of the original objective of creating an Art Studio to house Sharo’s paintings. This has left me poised at the intersection of past and future time, rooted in the now.

The EconoSpace Project Update, which you will see posted on the right of your screen, will bring you up to speed on recent developments. Basically the project has been refusing to move from the workshop onto the site! There were obvious physical reasons for this – the weather, difficult ground conditions, a hassle obtaining stone and so on. However underlying these rather obvious resistances something else was lurking. This, I now realise, is something in me and exploring this is has plunged me deeper into the mystery of sheltermaking. Essentially this has to do with living the future rather than living the past. This is the source of inspiration from which we gain emotional sustenance. We give this form when we make buildings in which to live our lives.

Living our lives to accord with inner direction carries us beyond rationale. The mind rails against such folly regularly issuing threats of impending catastrophe. When we bring such confusion to the building process we imprison ourselves in rigid structures blocking out the light of inspiration. This is why construction is such a macho activity and requires such immense firepower for its realisation. If we build sensitively we cannot but connect to inner direction.

This is exactly what is happening to me. It is becoming clear that putting energy into Sharo’s paintings is not part of my now. This is the source of the resistance to realising the Art Studio. If I accept this wholeheartedly – and I do – a whole new vista open up. This is where I am poised, a most interesting place to be. I cannot but laugh at the irony of all of this. I have been developing and teaching these ideas for almost 20 years in an itinerant sort of way. It is only now that I have ’settled’ that I am fully impacted by them! This is as fascinating as it is amusing.

My immediate attention is now focussed on the installation of the HeadSpace at the Dock Arts Centre in Carrick on Shannon in lovely Leitrim. This will be erected on Friday next August 17th. It will be up until the following Sunday. A new series of Courses in Sustainable House Design & Construction will begin on September 1st. which will keep me busy. I have also begun work on my Sheltermaking Theatre presentation which addresses the emotional issues surrounding the living architecture process. I will also be continuing work on the EconoSpace Project in its new guise as vehicle for my unfolding life.

So, stay tuned folks. I will be recording developments in the Architecture LIVE section of my website.

Next Sheltermaker – Autumn Equinox

To join the Sheltermaker eMailing List, email sheltermaker @ gmail.com