Crestone, Colorado
Crestone, Colorado: June 13-19, 2011
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**SORRY, This Workshop is FULL and there is NO Wait List**
I am looking forward to doing this workshop in Crestone as it has been many years since I was there. This small and close knit community rests in a high alpine mountainous paradise that is truly beautiful. Crestone offers the highest per capita of green built homes than anywhere else I have ever visited and it’s climate is perfectly suited for straw bale construction. Running a workshop there seems absolutely ideal.
General Home Description:
• Load Bearing Construction (1,125 sq ft exterior)
• Off-Grid
• Vastuved Design Principles
• Single Story/Shed Roof
Here is a description from the hosts:
Our straw bale project will take place in Crestone, Colorado, a small town at the foot of three 14,000 plus peaks in the Sangre de Cristo range, altitude 8,025 feet. Our project, an off-the-grid, one-story, load-bearing passive solar strawbale home, is rectangular in keeping with our Vastu architect’s idea of a mandala shape. Briefly, Vastu architecture, “transcendental home design in harmony with nature”, is a form of architecture based on sacred geometry which is becoming popular…it involves a mandala grid pattern (padas), having certain rooms put in certain directions (i.e. northeast, northwest, southwest, southeast…corresponding to water, air, earth, and fire) and also having the center of the home, the Bramasthan, free of obstructions so as to have it open to energize and encourage the flow of the home’s Prana.
Crestone is a hot bed for straw bale building…you will see many straw bales, cob homes, foam homes and other alternative building ideas in the neighborhood; in fact, four of the six homes in our immediate area are straw bale. We plan to use adobe bricks and earthen plasters for interior walls. The site of the project is 2.86 acres and we will have a small and a large tipi available for sleeping or meeting, a cooking/dining tent, solar showers and our swimming hole; a small creek is nearby.
Crestone, an old mining town in the 1800′s, is now known as a sustainable and alternative building mecca, as well as a spiritual center. There are thirteen spiritual centers on a high road overlooking the plains of the wide San Luis Valley: one Carmelite, four Zen Buddhist, seven Tibetan Buddhist, three Hindu, and one Shinto Buddhist. You will find two Stupas to explore, parks including a memorial park to Tibetan martyrs, a weekend farmers’ market, an Art Center, three grocery stores (two organic), five organic restaurants, and a riding stable where you can rent horses, all within a short distance of the town. Mountain climbing, hiking in North Crestone Creek, fishing, and river rafting are all nearby. Three hot springs, Joyful Journey, Valley View, and the Hooper Pool are within 45 minutes, tho our swimming hole in Cottonwood Creek is just a short walk from our lot.
The Great Sand Dunes National Park is about four miles from our land, although the drive takes more than an hour. This stunning wilderness area, with campgrounds and a visitor’s center, is a sight not to be missed, with thousands of acres of mountain-sized sand dunes to be climbed and admired. At night on our land you can sometimes hear the strange humming sound of the sands shifting.
As Crestone is surrounded by a national wildlife refuge on three sides, and the mountains on the fourth side, you are likely to see antelope, deer, elk, buffalo, hawks and eagles, and Crestone’s own favorite blue birds roaming the land around our property. A nice walking trail through the cottonwoods and with a view of the sand dunes, begins a couple of blocks away. The temperatures will average 80 degrees in the day and 40 at night.
**SORRY-This Workshop is FULL (NO Wait List)**
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