My next work will continue in the same abstract vein I have been following in the last ten years.  abstraction reflects our current state of mind, the way we process information and how we sometimes relate to one another.  It is just a fact of life and my sculpture is a frozen adverb to express the current we find ourselves in this first half of the the twenty first century.  It will continue to be abstract for a long long time.

Thanks to my good friend and fellow mountaineering buddy, Alex, I will soon be putting my architectural training to good use.  I was brought up with the concept of environmental design which does not mean the lastest gizmos and gadgets and whatever else technological experts are pushing these days.  Dont get me wrong, they are part of the evolution of design and serve an important purpose in our economy and etc.

passive solar is a very very old concept used by the vernacular architects throughout the world for eons.  Why? they work.  If a boat has a leak, don’t add a big motor to go faster, fix the leak.  Passive solar is the same analogy.  make your house or your house design reponsive to the environment.  this is not a theory.  think about what BTUs are and how to prevent lose of them and how to gather as much of them as possible.

Use whatever tools, techniques, intuition, science at your disposal to make a house comfortable using the sun’s power, without complicated systems.  Cost is always a consideration as well.  If it costs the same to make the house responsive to solar then do it!  The motors, pv, ducts and the rest of the techs that go into a home’s making should follow, and therefore, you can minimize their size and even the need for such things, just think about how heat can be transferred from the sun (sun’s path) into the house (glass and orientation) and then protected (insulation on the needed sides).

I will use this site to track the progress of this project and hopefully the end result with provide a working model for others to use and reference.

cheers

williemon

I need to post my mountaineering slideshow, which I just recently presented at Sports Basement.  My intentions in preparing the slideshow was two-fold.  First and foremost, I wanted to share with fellow mountaineering enthusiasts my experiences on Mount Shasta’s glaciers.  It truly is a fantastic place, beyond words.  Secondly, I was trying to get Sports Basement to hire me to help create a mountaineering department full of the stuff I love to buy and use in my adventures.  Guys like stuff and I am no exception.  I really am a geek when it comes to all the little stuff that make up the gear of a minimalist mountaineer.  I hope to put the slideshow up soon or at least set up a link to shutterfly thru my other website:  www.iggyalpine.shutterfly.com

cheers

all kinds of hammers, some texture the stone with bruises

carbide bits shape and form

polishing stone reveals all the beauty within

repairs are always part of the mix

Air hammers, chisels, hammers, angle grinders, diamond discs and carbide discs all make up part of the arsenal for working with alabaster, soupstone and marble from around the world.

chisels and air grinders

rescue pulleys, belay devices and prussicks used in self rescue and assisted rescue

glacier travel friendly crampons are flexible and hand sharpened

basic gear used for glacier travel and ice climbing

hand sharpened teeth