After practicing primitive living and building for several years, Natalie Bogwalker turned her attention to teaching. Bogwalker teaches many natural building techniques at her school, Wild Abundance. But what is natural building? There are so many different techniques, and Natalie helps us focus on practicality when it comes to choosing a natural building method. Natalie also has a strong background in permaculture and will give us a primer on how it intersects with the tiny house movement. Natalie is here to share the message that learning to build is a gateway to self-empowerment.

In This Episode:

  • How a school that was intended to teach permaculture also came to teach building
  • What happens during the ten day tiny house class?
  • Learning how to meet your basic needs is empowering
  • What does Wild Abundance do with all the builds?
  • Description of the round log cabin
  • Tips on materials for mobile tiny houses
  • Natalie's advice to women builders
  • What does “a focus on practicality” mean regarding natural building?
  • Sometimes you need help

Links and Resources:

Guest Bio:

Natalie Bogwalker

Natalie Bogwalker

Natalie Bogwalker teaches Women’s Basic Carpentry and Tiny House building at her school, Wild Abundance, near Asheville, NC. Natalie loves building and has done so since building birdhouses with her dad as a small child. She has a strong background in, and also teaches permaculture, and weaves permaculture principles, as well as a passion for using local materials and natural building into her work and classes. Empowering women to build for themselves is especially near and dear to Natalie’s heart.

Facebook @wildabundance

Instagram @wildabundance 

Twitter @wildabundance

 

This Week's Sponsor:

Tiny House Decisions Cover

Tiny House Decisions

Tiny House Decisions is the super helpful guidebook that I wrote 5 years ago to share all of the knowledge and decisions that I made to build my own tiny house, along with what I did right, what I did wrong, and how I would change things. The guidebook, now in its second edition, has been completely rewritten and expanded to reflect how tiny houses are being built today and it also includes several new tiny house stories from other tiny house dwellers. The guidebook has been expanded to include things like SIPs, metal framing, and different types of insulation, and I seriously think this is the most helpful thing you can buy if you are thinking about living in a tiny house. If you go through the guidebook from start to finish, you will have a solid plan for all the systems and everything else that’s going to go into your tiny house. The second edition has been a long time in the making and I’m really excited to share it with the world. 

To learn more you can head over to thetinyhouse.net/thd.

 

More Photos:

Wild Abundance sign

The sign

Natalie building

Natalie building

Helping

Teamwork makes the dream work

They look like they're having fun!

You have to make time for pictures

What great smiles!

Space-saving shelf under the stairs

Wild Abundance in the winter

The round-log cabin

Charlie's Angels?

More of the round-log cabin

Measure twice; cut once

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