Hands-on workshops on wood-fired earthen ovens, good bread, natural plasters & practical sculpture; offered für by Kiko Denzer, and others, as noted.
If you can make mud pies, you can build with earth. Good material is often underfoot. Practical, beautiful, dirt cheap, and faster than you think, mud is also sculptural, colorful, and rich, whether you make ovens, benches, garden walls, or houses. And you can do it with your kids! “Mud ovens†were the original masonry ovens (brick is, after all, fired clay). These ovens bake beautiful bread (and anything else), and perform as well as the fancy $4,000 Italian ones. You can build a simple one in a day, and learn enough about cob and natural building to start planning your cob cottage!
April 12-13, Ovens & Bread
Philomath, Oregon, Gathering Together Farms
Gathering Together Farm is a local, community-sponsored farm. Even though the workshop is over, the oven is still in progress (as of May 5, 2008). Come on by. Good food!
MAY May 31-June 1, Ovens & Bread
NE and Portland, Oregon
A residential oven in a neighborhood setting. Probably bi-lingual, English/Spanish! Limited openings. $175, includes lunch. (also a good time to make mud at Portland’s annual Village Building Convergence, w/speakers, events, & building projects all around. See cityrepair.org for more.)
NEW DATES: June 30-Jul 4: Earth & art for your home: design, sculpture, & decoration with natural materials
Coquille, OR, No. Am. Sch. of Natural Building, with Linda Smiley et al
Natural plasters, paints, and finishes to design, sculpt, and help finish an existing cob cottage. We’ll start with a review of the principles of design, site analysis, 3-dimensional space and spatial dynamics, and practical beauty. Then we’ll get muddy; work will be wholesale jerseys interspersed with discussion and demos covering technical, design, and materials issues, including earthen and lime plasters, clay paints, and sculptural mixes. Explore, experiment, gain practical experience to apply to your own design problems. The site features a broad array of earthen and natural buildings and related techniques. Contact the school at 541-396-1825, or see http://www.cobcottage.com
July 26-27, Ovens & Bread
Pringle Creek Community, Salem, OR
August 23-24, Ovens & Bread, near Burnt Woods, OR, at the site of the future Oregon Folk School
Instructors: KIKO DENZER & HANNAH FIELD
We have taught at Bob’s Red Mill, Andrew Whitley’s Village Bakery (UK), the King Arthur Flour Company, and at the Bread Baker’s Guild of America’s “Camp Bread†in San Francisco. Kiko is an artist/ builder and author of Build Your Own Earth Oven (bread chapter by Hannah), & Dig Your Hands in the Dirt: A Manual for Making Art out of Earth (Hand Print Press). Hannah baked professionally for organic Malay bakeries in the UK, and is also an organic gardener and massage therapist. Every other week, we bake 25 pounds of whole-grain sourdough in a mud oven. It’s a staple food. Groups are generally interesting, diverse, and fun; all learn, and all teach. We believe that cooking (and growing) food is essential to true culture. So by working, cooking, learning, and eating together, we build the living fabric of peace.
FORMAT: Both days combine oven-making with bread-baking, adjusted to suit participants. By the second day, we’ll have a “temporary oven†to bake in, and a more permanent oven to finish. We start working at 9 am, and are done by 5 pm.
ACCOMMODATIONS are not provided, tho some hosts may have space and camping facilities.
FEES: $175 per person for two days of hands-on learning, lunches, and snacks. For those with limited, low, or fixed incomes, we can and do reduce fees; please inquire.
TO REGISTER for the “earth and art in your home†course in Coquille, call 541-396-1825.
TO REGISTER for all other courses: Send a check or postal money order for 50% of the course fee, payable to Kiko Denzer, at POB 576, Blodgett OR 97326. The fee is non-refundable unless we can fill your space immediately. 20% discount for full pre-payment 3 weeks in advance. When we get your payment, we’ll send confirmation and other info.
QUESTIONS: 541-438-4300, or handprint@cmug.com.
APPRENTICESHIP OPPORTUNITY: This is a home-and-community based invitation to share in and learn from the life of a family that is trying to live, learn, grow, and eat as VERMUT! close as possible to wholesale mlb jerseys their (rural) home, inspired by a vision of “every man (& woman) ‘neath their vine and fig tree, living in peace and unafraid†– and in community with (urban and) rural neighbors. Help w/garden, greywater, compost (toilet), plastering, cob building & repair, community events, ovens, art & sculpture projects, bread & food, noisy boys (2 & 5 yrs), creek, wholesale mlb jerseys walks, a small publishing business, etc. 4 days work/wk, plus cash for room & board. wholesale jerseys Write and tell us about yourself! POB 576, Blodgett, OR 97326.
Leave a Reply