I bet you’ve dreamed of living on your very own island, away from the stresses of everyday life, surrounded by beauty, great weather and stunning fauna and flora. It was a line in Robinson Crusoe that resonated with me when Daniel Defoe wrote “I was absolute lord and lawgiver, they all owed their lives to [...]

The Whaley House was built in 1857 on land that formerly held gallows.  It is not only the most haunted house in America, it was even haunted before it was built.  The first ghost to roam the area where the rooms would be built was that of James “Yankee Jim” Robinson.  But we’ll get to [...]

Meet Klara Marosszeky.  She has been working for 10 years to create viable building material out of…hemp. That wall she’s leaning against?  Yep.  Made out of hemp.  Hemp and lime, pressed into a form.  The substance hardens and ta da!  You’ve got hempcrete.  The advantages of this method are numerous.  The building material is resistant [...]

In May of 2010 the internet was crawling with articles about a fantastic mansion, inn, marina, restaurant, and private beach for sale in Massachusetts.  The property (kit and kaboodle) once belonged to the Bancrofts and the Barrons – Dow Jones and Wall Street Journal heirs.  Later, a smart and very rich investor named Peter Roy [...]

What are the things that you can’t do in a city?  You can’t raise livestock (at least, not very easily), you can’t live on an acre or more of land (unless you’re way loaded), and you can’t really grow food.  At least not a lot of it – enough to feed an entire population.  What [...]

How do you make an ancient structure modern and livable?  Katsuhiro Miyamoto and Associates figured it out with the Hankai House in Akashi City.  The original structure has many old pieces – roof parts and walls that date back to anywhere between 90 and 300 years ago. The original structure was a wooden gate house [...]