After nearly 30 years of living and working in Madison, Wisconsin, we longed for a rural home. We’d spent several frustrating years looking for rural property, but anything with livable buildings ...

WEST CHAZY, N.Y. — The dumbest robins in New York state live on a ledge outside Rob Roy’s kitchen window. Or at least they would like to roost there. On a recent Monday morning, Roy, 65, and his wife, ...

FOUNTAIN CITY, Wis. — Richard Flateau built a cordwood home 35 years ago as an eco-friendly way to live mortgage free. He and his wife, Becky, read a magazine article about a man from New Brunswick, ...

Earthwood, in upstate New York, was built using cordwood masonry. Rob and Jaki Roy laid cedar logs into a wall. Photographs by Tony Cenicola / The New York Times WEST CHAZY, New York - Rob and Jaki ...

"Cordwood Building" collects the wisdom of more than 25 of the world's best practitioners, detailing the long history of the method, and demonstrating how to build a cordwood home using the latest and ...

When Alan Stankevitz bought land near La Crescent, Minn., he knew he wanted to build an eco-friendly home there. But he wasn't sure what kind. An earth-sheltered house? "You need a crew to pour the ...

WHITE EARTH, Minn. -- A northern Minnesota school teacher will soon move into an unusual new home built of firewood logs. It's part of an effort to create affordable, energy-efficient homes on the ...

Summer is finally well on its way. The robins are singing, the mosquitoes are out. And a young man’s thoughts turn to building things. When I was a little guy, I built birdhouses. A few years later, I ...