DIY: woodworking

Henrique Oliveira, Wood Installation, Inhabitat

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At the risk of generating another 5 spam emails a day related to woodworking and woodworking plans, here goes.  Woodworking can be a very expensive hobby, as practiced by Frank (Look at all that equipment!) or it can be very low-key, which is the way I do it. Here's a video by Frank of building a lawn chair, well actually, his machinery building the chair:

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Frank is indeed a fine cinematograher.

But back to the topic of woodworking.  For cutting wood I use a handsaw, a small top-handle saber saw (there seems to be a lot of confusion on the web between 'saber' and 'reciprocating' saw), and a variable-speed drill. To shape the wood I use chisels, a rasp, files, and sometimes a drill attachment that sands/grinds. Dremel tools are handy for fine detail and light finishing. A sander comes in handy for large flat areas. For putting things together I use a hammer, a tack hammer, the drill fitted with a screwdriver bit, and fasteners suitable for the material at hand. A pencil and measuring tools help. A drill bit set is a must, also a good selection of sandpaper grits. And wood glue is helpful. Then there's painting and staining.

I choose my projects carefully and usually use a good grade of plywood. What can you build with plywood? The blog Dishfunctional Designs has some interesting ideas. If you like working large and with recycled wood, take a look at Henrique Oliveira's wood installation. There is a selection of more functional designs, some of them requiring more advanced equipment, at Instructables on the Let's make plywood page, popular selection.

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Plywood Bowl, Dishfunctional Design

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There's more than can be said about this topic, so I'll probably revisit it in the future.

-- Marge

DIY: earth homes

Mankind has been building with earthen materials for ages.  Think adobe, brick, turf, and rock.  Earth houses take a number of forms--above ground, below ground, embedded in an embankment, and so on.  Building materials range from bagged dirt to old tires, concrete to fiberglass composites. 

To get an idea of the organic beauty that can be achieved in building underground, take a look at the article "Beautiful Swiss House is Buried Under the Earth," published by Inhabitat.

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Underground home, Vals, Switzerland, Inhabitat

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The house pictured above is part of a complex designed by Vetsch Architektur.  More about the complex and more images can be found in "Unconventional Earth Homes in Switzerland."  Construction details can be found at Greenroofs.

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Unconventional earth homes in Switzerland, inthralld

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If you prefer to build above ground, here's information about a Superadobe earth home. Cal-Earth (California Institute of Earth Art and Architecture) describes the building process in detail.  It is reported to be low-cost.  Below is the interior of a home built with Superadobe.

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Superadobe earth home interior, Busyboo

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Terminology for underground homes includes earth-sheltered, earth-bermed, earth-covered, earth-bunded,  and subterranean. Prefabricated components for an earth-sheltered house are available, such as the ones manufactured by Colfibrex.

Dragonfly Hill is a blog that chronicles building an earth-sheltered home. Below Michael G. Smith describes his craft--building above ground with earth and straw.

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Since there are no step-by-step project instructions (that I can find) available for underground homes, just notes on what you should keep in mind, I urge you to look at my earth homes playlist.

 -- Marge

DIY: Mosquito repellent

Here an Anopheles stephensi female is gorged with blood and
beginning to pass unwanted liquid fractions of the blood
to make room for more of the solid nutrients in her gut (Wikipedia)

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There are two main reasons to make your own mosquito repellent or buy an herbal one: avoid using products with DEET and keep the damn mosquitoes and whatever off.  This year, here in Alaska, they are particularly voracious and the stings itch for days, if not treated.  You can buy products that are supposed to relieve the itching, but I found one of the best treatments is dabbing on a little witch hazel.

Stories about DEET abound.  I've heard fishermen report that contact with DEET-containing repellent took the varnish off their fishing rods.  The CDC's ATSDR (Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry) site has an article on its Health Effects in Humans. And Wikipedia's article on DEET is very good.

There are many recipes for herbal repellents online.  Most of them use essential oils.  Here's a site, Mountain Rose Herbs, selected at random to illustrate how essential oils may be offered.  Be careful of the term aromatherapy, many products offered are a mixture of oils, blended with a specific purpose such as stress relief, aphrodisiac, purification, and so on. Amazon has a good selection; best to search for the oil specifically by name.  Another thing to keep in mind is that some essential oils should be diluted with a carrier oil, which can be olive or grapeseed oil--so follow the recipe.

Inhabitat has a collection of  "Homemade Insect Repellent Sprays and Lotions." Wellness Mama offers a variety of recipes, including ones that use dried herbs. 

Here's a recipe I found a while ago, but haven't tried yet.

Ingredients:
1/2 liter of alcohol
100 gram of whole cloves
100 ml of baby oil or similar (almond, sesame, chamomile, lavender, fennel, etc)

Preparation:
Leave cloves to marinate in alcohol four days
Stir every morning and evening
After 4 days add the oil
It's now ready to use.

How to use:
Gently rub a few drops into the skin of the arms and legs.
Observe the mosquitoes fleeing the room.
Repels fleas on pets too.

One of my favorite ready-made repellents is Herbal Armor, which can be purchased at Amazon.

I find that these natural repellents last about half-an-hour, then must be refreshed.

Also, I couldn't resist including the Russian sculpture below.

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Valery Chaliy, mosquito sculpture, Laughing Squid

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-- Marge

DIY: Seedbombing and guerilla gardening

My thought was to offer a few ideas for indoor gardening (more about that later), then I discovered Greenaid. Quoting the introduction at the sponsoring organization's site Commonstudio,

As cities become the pre-eminent human habitat, new questions are emerging about how we can better empower urban dwellers to feel more connected to their everyday surroundings.A growing movement known as “guerilla gardening” hopes to spark these larger shifts in consciousness and action, and a tiny but powerful tool known as the “seedbomb” has been used by guerilla gardeners for decades to transform the forgotten niches of the urban landscape.  Made from a mixture of clay, compost and seeds, these green “pixels” can be thrown or planted virtually anywhere, creating more vibrant places worth caring for.  Greenaid is Commonstudio’s multi-year initiative focused on making seedbombs more accessible to the general public by channeling the power of social enterprise.

A couple of their projects are seedbomb vending and D3 (Dream it, Design it, Do it).  To offer seedbombs to consumers and potential bombers, they put up some prototype vending machines in the Los Angeles area.

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Greenaid, SeedbombVending, The Commonstudio

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With the D3 project, a program for K-12 students, Commonstudio asked: "How might we build creative confidence in young people by channeling their interests through the lens of design?"

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D3 methodology, The Commonstudio

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If bombing and other green guerilla offensives are not your thing, how about a vertical green garden in your apartment or flat?

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Flora Grubb, Vertical Garden, Inhabitat

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If you like avocados and want to make use of the seeds, here's how:

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AlissaSueK, Growing Avocado Plants From Seed, Instructables

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-- Marge

Organic Cities

My eye was caught the other day by this image at suckerPunch:

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ta (David) YU, Thesis: Organic city plaza, suckerPunch

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It's part of a SCI-Arc M.Arch 2 thesis by ta (david) YU.  Here's another view:

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ta (David) YU, Thesis: Organic city overview, suckerPunch

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Frank Lloyd Wright in his book An Organic Architecture, published in 1939, proposed

"So here I stand before you preaching organic architecture: declaring organic architecture to be the modern ideal and the teaching so much needed if we are to see the whole of life, and to now serve the whole of life, holding no 'traditions' essential to the great TRADITION. Nor cherishing any preconceived form fixing upon us either past, present or future, but - instead - exalting the simple laws of common sense - or of super-sense if you prefer - determining form by way of the nature of materials..."

One of his designs is the David and Gladys Wright house in Phoenix, Arizona.

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From the Wikipedia article on organic architecture, here's a statement of its aims by one architect:

Architect and planner David Pearson proposed a list of rules towards the design of organic architecture. These rules are known as the Gaia Charter for organic architecture and design. It reads: "Let the design:

• be inspired by nature and be sustainable, healthy, conserving, and diverse.
• unfold, like an organism, from the seed within.
• exist in the "continuous present" and "begin again and again".
• follow the flows and be flexible and adaptable.
• satisfy social, physical, and spiritual needs.
• "grow out of the site" and be unique.
• celebrate the spirit of youth, play and surprise.
• express the rhythm of music and the power of dance."

For a survey of the 21 Greatest Buildings of the 21st Century, take a look at this Gear Patrol page.  Another selection of buildings, Organic Architecture: 12 Beautifully Curved Buildings, is offered by Web Urbanist.
 

Of course, one building does not a city make.  And issues of how cities grow are not addressed here. As  ta (david) YU says about a city's evolution--

The forming of the urban context is based on the existing territory, something that changes slowly, and human activities, which are changing all the time. Due to the non-stop pace of human activities, the urban context remains in a cycle of perpetual negotiation. Like organic tissue, the city is always in a state of growth, decay, and rebirth.

 

Note that organic building is another topic.

-- Marge

DIY: cardboard furniture, the Wiggle Chair, and other pieces

In the early 70's artist-architect-entrepreneur Frank Gehry gave the world the "Wiggle Chair," pictured below.  Possibly the first piece of cardboard furniture, it's also a fine piece of art.  For more information on the history of cardboard as furniture, take a look at "Cardboard furniture. Are you kidding?" by Kerry Derwent-Robb.

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Frank Gehry, "Wiggle Chair" (1972), Sailko

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If you would like to try your hand at making some cardboard objects/furniture, you can find a bunch of ideas (no projects) at Inhabitat.  The sample below is for sale at Vicara Exploratory Design:

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Fabio Afonso, "Cartonado de Mesa," Vicara

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You can find some good information, templates, and ideas for cardboard projects at the Leo Kempf site. Here's an illustration of one of his projects:

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Leo Kempf, "Speech-Bubble Discussion Coffee Table"

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Foldschool also has some projects; they're well documented with a manual and patterns you can download.

If you just want to read more about cardboard furniture, try Gizmodo and Chairigami.

-- Marge

DIY book storage

With school back in session the eternal struggle with keeping your books in order and yet accessible resumes.  The stack of board-brick-board design is always an option, but there are other options too.  Keep in mind that you'll be attending classes, doing homework (hopefully), and want to have a bit of a social life as well -- so best to keep the amount of work spent on setting up the book storage to a minimum.

Starting with the stack option, here's an example posted by The Crazy Craft Lady (the shelves are in the back, Pippa's in front).  Best not to make the shelves more that 4 tiers high for safety's sake.
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Stacked shelves, TheCrazyCraftLady.com

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Bookends are an alternative to shelves and there are lots of do-it-yourself projects for bookends online, but many of them look like they would be more annoying than functional. Steve Ramsey at Woodworking for Mere Mortals offers instructions for bookends that really work.  They also look like a lot of work to make.
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Bookends that really work, WoodworkingForMereMortals.com

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With all this in mind, I'm opting for modular storage that can be stacked on the floor or on a desk or table top.

By far the simplest, most elegant design is Miso's X-shelf, found at Inhabitat.  As far as I can tell this shelf is not offered for retail sale, so you'll have to build it.  Looks pretty simple though -- a number of boards with slots in the middle and the short edges mitered.  You might want to connect each X in some way; possibly with brass flat braces and brass screws.  Take a look:
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Miso X-shelf, Inhabitat.com

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A spice rack from Ikea might work for a few oft-used books, but it will have to be hung on the wall and there is likely a weight limit.  Still, it's only $3.99 (shipping to San Francisco is $11.00);  at Amazon the item costs $13.31.
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Ikea Spice Rack, Ikea.com

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My final suggestion is modular storage cubes/systems.  To me iCube is the most interesting. Amazon carries a fair selection of the brand, but I'm not seeing plain cubes without a center divider except in the four-cube kit for $76.57 (black).  Individual cubes (with center shelves) average $15-16).
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Remember to put the heavier stuff toward the bottom of the stack.

-- Marge