Couple Builds Home for $10,000 Made Entirely From Reclaimed & Recycled Goods
I’d wager that most of us occasionally feel as though the pace of modern life has gotten a bit too hectic. Dire headlines and 24-hour news cycles, strained budgets and stagnating wages, 60-hour work weeks and sketchy sleep cycles — it can all seem too much, can’t it?
Of course, few of us ever do anything about it. We simply continue on with our hectic schedule, whiling our lives away little bit by little bit.
Or perhaps I should say that most of us do. Milwaukee, Wisconsin, couple Taylor and Steph Bode made about as big a break with modern society as I can imagine.
“Steph and I were 25 years old and fantasized about experiencing a simpler life, the whole Walden Pond, slowing down, and reconnecting with nature idea,” Taylor told the Daily Mail.
“We also believed in the potential of a minimalist, self-sufficient, environmentally conscious approach to architecture and lifestyle, particularly as a solution for low-cost housing in critically impoverished parts of the world.”
So in 2014, the couple decided to build their own house. Nothing surprising there, plenty of people have rolled up their sleeves and erected a roof over their heads.
What was fascinating about the Bode’s approach was the way in which they went about it. The couple built their 560-square-foot home entirely out of recycled materials and with no connection to public utilities.
They scavenged for discarded tires, bottles, lumber, windows, and furniture. By burying several specific walls deep into the earth, they were able to keep the temperature inside relatively stable year-round, relying only on solar energy for heat.
Solar and wind power also provide them with electricity. Even the floor is natural — a blend of clay, sand, straw, and water that they then coated with hemp oil to make it more solid.
There’s definitely an ideological bent to the Bode’s innovation. “Living in a passive-solar, earth-sheltered home has a way of forcing a direct connection with diurnal rhythms and the processes of nature,” Taylor said.
“You acutely observe the sun moving across the sky each day from east to west, with the penetration of direct solar gain increasing as the days get shorter and the temperatures colder.
“In a world where we often struggle to see beyond the screen of our smartphone or tablet, living in an earthship-style house offers a constant reminder that land and nature is our life-supporting community, one in which we are privileged to be a part of.”
That’s all well and good, but for many overworked and cash-strapped people, the biggest draw may well be the house’s price. Taylor and Steph built the whole thing for a mere $10,000.
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