This is a book about building and architecture. It's also a book about an idea, the notion of a room of one's own, a cosy private space that we can withdraw into, a place in which to think, read, reflect, and just be for a while, away from the endless demands of a busy world.
The impetus for this book came when the author decided to build a writing room, a study, out in the woods that made up his back garden. Had he hired someone to build it for him, as any of us would’ve done, the building of this writing room would’ve been the familiar story of someone dealing with architects and contractors, the ballooning costs and endless delays.
This book has all of that, but it has a whole lot more because Pollan’s inspiration for this project came not just from a desire to have a space of his own to work in, but also from a desire to build it himself.
He says that he had many reasons for wanting to build something with his own hands, but the chief reason was the desire to create something real, material and tangible. He wanted to step away from the world of words and screens which is where he spends most of his time, and challenge himself to learn new skills and to do something he'd never so much as attempted before.
He says in the book, and I quote...I have always found that process wonderful and slightly mysterious, and the people involved—architects and builders—particularly impressive characters. Architects do their work on the frontier between the ideal and the practical, translating wisps of ideas into buildable facts, and carpenters are among those lucky souls whose handiwork actually adds to the available stock of reality.
Pollan built his writing room by working weekends over a period of two and half years with the help of an experienced carpenter and handyman. Though he began as a novice, being the assistant and following instructions, he learnt over time, how to mix and pour concrete, how to build a foundation, how to handle wood, how to cut it, sand it and join it with other pieces of wood to build a bookshelf, a writing table and more.
There have been many books about building and renovating houses and other structures, but this one is different because the narrative does not stick to the details of the particular building that it is about. What it does, is move from the particular to the general and back again.
Throughout this narrative Pollan writes about everything that he was doing and learning in the process of building, and then he pans out to write about architecture and design in general, and the way they have evolved over time. He writes about conventions in architecture that have changed from traditional, functional and common-sense designs to art forms that while expressive and beautiful, don’t always work for the people who have to live with them.
This blending of the personal, the general and the historical is what makes the book so engaging. It is part memoir, part history, part cultural commentary, made all the more charming by Pollan's intense curiousity about everything that goes into constructing a building, and his desire to learn and aquire new skills.
Running through the thread of this narrative is the idea I mentioned befiore of a room or a place of one’s own, how precious and necessary that is. Pollan writes about the connection between the cultivation of the self, as a being with a rich interior life and having a space of one’s own like a study to cultivate that self in. He traces the evolution of the humanist concept of the self which dates back to the renaissance, and the way this led to ideas about privacy and personal space, which in turn influenced the way we design and build our homes.
This is a remarkable book that is full of ideas and insights about everything from architecture, design, construction and woodworking, to history, philosophy, culture and tradition. It's an engaging, well-written, thoroughly delightful read.
Thats all for now. I'll be back soon to tell you about another of my favorite books. Thanks for listening.