![]() ![]() Right from the front cover, showing a stunning earth-built mosque in Yemen, you are entranced. It is beautiful enough to take your breath away and inspiring enough to move you to build something beautiful. ![]() What is the effect on the psyche of a culture to be so surrounded by rectilinear boxes so bereft of grace and beauty? When did a cement-built house profoundly move you?īuilt by Hand is a rare gem. And in the fifty years since the concrete revolution began ravaging our land it has laid waste to our indigenous vernacular buildings, as well as to our sense of having some kind of ownership over the shelter-making process, and we have also, perhaps, lost a shared sense of what a beautiful building might look like. ![]() Houses were generally built to last using local materials, and as they aged, they acquired a sense of grace and a venerability all too rare in our age of disposable buildings.Īnd then along came concrete. Ingeniously simple design solutions, no architects, engineers or building control officers, and a real sense of place, all combined to make buildings with a timeless quality. From the mud-built cities of Yemen to the igloos of Alaska the homes we build have responded to and defined our culture, our traditions, our climate, and our creativity. (2003)**įor thousands of years humankind has created shelter for itself in a dazzling array of styles and forms. **Built By Hand, by Bill Steen, Athena Steen, and Eiko Komatsu. Built By Hand – Steen, Steen & Komatsu (2003) ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |