2015 was the first time I stood with my feet in a mud pit. It was an experience that planted so many seeds for the life I am still living today.
I thought I was going to learn a new skill. What I came away with was a group of amazing friends, the inspiration to try something and also the confidence to build a building. It was the single most empowering experience of my life.
It was physical work and so much more. We mixed with our feet, passed bricks along a line and raised walls together. I had a permanent red earth mud-i-cure from the iron-rich clay of Chiang Dao. The work was slow and it was shared. Somewhere in those days I understood that the building was only one part of what was happening. The unexpected part (for me back then) was relational. It was the people. It was the way we took care of each other as much as the building.
Something else rearranged my future. I never thought I could build a whole house. Once upon a time I worked in finance, arranging and underwriting mortgages for self builds so I knew people did build houses – but for so much money. Or by spending decades paying off the debt. I am a maker of things – I’m good with my hands and I love to learn crafts. Even so, I never thought I could ever build my own home. It was something we could make ourselves, on our own terms. It really blew my brain apart to think this was possible.
Once you feel that, you cannot ‘unfeel’ it. When we work together, in community, we make things that matter. Things that hold us. Things that go on supporting us for a lifetime. I found my way into that world and I have been here ever since. Sometimes I wonder if this is simply how we used to live, and how life was meant to be.
My home now sits in a small forest about 30 minutes south of Chiang Mai. Once it was bare sand, old mango trees and not one green leaf. Now it’s crowded with trees and village chickens. I designed and built so much along the way, mostly by hand. Trial and error has taught me a lot, and much of what is still here I learned from nature herself.
This is what I want to share.
From 16 to 22 January 2027, I’m opening my home for the Womens Tiny Mud House Workshop: a week of building a small earthen house together, from the ground up.
I’ll share more about what it holds in the next story. For now, I just wanted to tell you where it comes from.