Architecture LIVE 1
| The LIVE unfolding of the EconoSpace Project |
| Leitrim, Ireland, May 12 2009 |
| Architecture LIVE 1 |
| Síog welcomes us with wind and water. It is a day or more before we can make the rounds, skirting the boundaries between the showers. The sky presides over this homecoming, stretched to the horizon where the hot sun lights up the cloud. When this moving picture stills I begin to orient myself. |
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| Demands surge from the ether borne on gusts which shake the cabin and lay claim to my attention. It’s difficult to know where to start. The EconoSpace frame appears large or small by turns according to my changing mood. Seeming urgencies such as obtaining wheels or an internet connection fail to catch my attention. Alanna and I take turns on the daybed studying the sky or one of the many books we have returned with. |
| Out in the world I gaze like a child at the passing scenes. Fields of sheep and lambs. Wet cows with hot breaths. People with sickly looks and empty smiles. Closed shops and To Let signs. Cars, bundled up against the cold. Magnificent trees which have seen it all before. |
| Everything appears to be as we left it. Clearly it is I that has changed. I acknowledge this in contemplation and in words spoken aloud in the cabin. Alanna concurs and returns to the composition of a Press Release for the Eco Living Festival which is now only weeks away. |
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| I have shed a protective layer and feel naked in the face of the familiar. This feeling encourages me forwards, distracts me with the minutiae of daily life. Kindling to be chopped. Fires to be lit. Food to be cooked. Bags to be unpacked. |
| The seemingly mundane is filled with meaning, slowing my forward momentum until I finally come to rest. |
| I am restless in this new state moving like a caged animal. I plant a tree using the pendulum for guidance. That is the clearest indicator yet of how I have changed – allowing the invisible realms to pervade my actions. This is the place where control is yielded, where the dividing line is drawn. |
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| This is the line which carves up the world into its distinctive parts. On the one hand stand the rationalists. On the other the intuitives. More and more I find myself allied to the latter, deaf to the pleas of the rationalists. Such is the state of the world. |
| I have lodged in this place before but never so securely even where this security is marked by change and the unexpected. |
| The newly erected gates assist this fledgling security holding the world at bay. I feel protected, calmer, more certain that the inward direction is the only one to follow. How this will outpicture in the architecture is anyone’s guess. |
| The overall plan is to install the roof and to begin the infilling of the walls with clay-straw. Before that we will do some experiments to get the feel of the materials and refine our working techniques. I will also have ot craft a new layout for the interior of the building, assigning window and door positions and configuring how and where its companion buildings will adjoin it. |
| I have been on this road before. The standing frame was originally to be an art studio to house the numerous paintings of my late wife. It was also destined to occupy a different location on the site until life intervened and called a halt to progress. Confounded by my inability to progress this construction, despite copious amount of help and materials, I’d had to call a halt to things. |
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| It was at this point that Alanna entered the equation clarifying the muddied pool of my ambition and turning my world on its head. It is this perspective more than anything this has allowed me to yield to the unknown, to trust in the invisible realms in a whole new way. |
| Transporting my ideas to the antipodes has allowed me to see the boundaries which I imposed upon my self. More than anything it was presenting workshops in Taiwan, in the home of Feng Shui, which awakened me. Of course life energy, or chi as the Chinese call it, is the essence of architecture, just as it is the essence of life! |
| It’s not that I ever doubted this, but I definitely held back from pushing that agenda more firmly in Ireland. |
| So to The Now and the forward progress of our lives and of our architecture. There are plenty of challenges, not the least of which is a tight budget. So it will be that ways will be found to circumvent these. |
| At last the rain gives way to sun. This rearrangement of the elements is an intrinsic part of Ireland. Earth gives way to sky. Water to fire. So it is our days are renewed. |
| I head north to the Organic Centre to give a talk on mortgage-free housing. The counrtyside is basking in newfound warmth. Ills are forgotten. The yellow is on the broom. Bluebells cast inviting looks in all directions. Bog cotton blankets vast stretches of open land. |
| A cluster of people gather round to hear what I have to say. The usual issues arise. |
| ‘When you talk about mortgage-free shelter do you mean temporary housing?’ |
| ‘Temporary housing – just like our bodies you mean?’ |
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| This exchange sets the tone for what follows. The new me speaking from beyond the old boundaries. I can feel people tighten up and react looking for a way to disengage. We are at the heart of the Irish condition – they can see it all but refuse to talk about it or to make it conscious. |
| This self imposed gravity is a silent meance which can devour the unwary. The trick is to dodge the charge or at least deflect it back to where it came from. |
| A less than exciting start to my Irish sojurn. |
| Architecture LIVE 2 |