Woodsman

by Ben Law

these words should understand

  I had been living on the land for over three years. If that had increased to four years without any action being taken, I could have been in a position to claim a lawful development certificate. At the time, however, I knew nothing of this. I knew that charcoal burners and woodsman had often lived simply in the woods, and considering that planning law only came into being in 1948, these woodland practices clearly preceded it.

  After appealing against the enforcement order and losing my appeal, I put in an application for planning permission for a mobile home and gained temporary planning permission for three years. It is normal practice to be given three years for agricultural/forestry enterprises to see if they are viable. In order to achieve planning permission on the land you have two ‘tests’ to pass. The first is the economic viability of the enterprise. I submitted accounts and business forecasts that I managed to meet and exceed during my three years’ temporary permission. The second test is the essential need test. On agricultural land, it is accepted that it is an essential need to be on the land to look after livestock. But with forestry, the essential need was not so clear to the authorities, although it was obvious enough to me. Charcoal burning and tending charcoal fires at night within a woodland is clearly an essential need. This is supported by the need to not commute to work, as well as the wide range of produce and activities at Prickly Nut Wood that make it like a woodland farm, and therefore in need of day and night attention.

  As my three years’ temporary permission neared its end, I was already planning how to build a dwelling that would sit lightly in the sensitive woodland environment of Prickly Nut Wood. I wanted to build a timber house and I wanted to use sweet chestnut coppice. (I had no idea at this time that my interest in building with roundwood and natural materials would become a niche market and a key component of my future work.)

  I had experimented in the building of a small boathouse and picked up the idea of a ‘cruck frame’. This traditional timber frame is a fairly primitive type of ‘A’ frame and I could see its potential when building with round poles. I was fortunate to spend three years living in a mobile home on the very spot I would be building the house. This gave me plenty of time to work out the movement of the sun and how I wanted to orientate doors and windows. I drew up designs, and then contracted architect John Rees to draw them up to planning application standard and submit the drawings to the planners. My planning application was met with a fair amount of resistance, as it was without doubt a controversial application. I had a dialogue with the case officer (then the chief enforcement officer) and we discussed how we could allow me to continue to live and work at Prickly Nut Wood but avoid any risk of land speculation. We came up with personal conditions that allowed the dwelling for my lifetime, provided I continued to burn charcoal and run a woodland business of coppicing at Prickly Nut Wood. The dwelling was therefore legally tied to me personally and would be removed in the event of my death, or if I stopped the charcoal burning and coppice management activities. With such conditions tied to the planning application to safeguard against land speculation, the committee approved the application and building could begin. I was happy with the conditions, as it was essential to me that any dwelling was tied to the management of the woods.

  * * *

  The building of the woodland house at Prickly Nut Wood was a journey within my own life’s journey and one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. When you have spent ten years drawing water from a well, then heating up the water over a fire for every shower and every bowl of washing-up water, the thought of hot, running water and a warm home where clothes stay dry and papers do not get damp and mouldy seems like a vast leap into an unimaginable future. There is also the primal, instinctive sense of building one’s nest. I had roamed the forest for ten years and it was time to create my shelter. I had no idea that this way of building would become a niche market for me in the future and that I was embarking on building the prototype of a new architectural vernacular.

  I was excited about the building process. My caravan roof had so many holes in it, I was now harvesting buckets of rainwater on the inside. All around the buckets I covered the walls of the caravan with sheets of flipchart paper on which I planned and managed the build. These sheets covered all the details and eventualities that I, who had never built a house before, could imagine. Of course, there were a few things I missed, but for a first attempt I did pretty well. I knew the build could work really successfully as a teaching tool for the sustainable building unit in permaculture courses, and I wanted to film it for this purpose. I arranged the filming but the company pulled out at the last moment on account of other commitments, and I was left four weeks before the build was due to start with no one to film it.

  I then contacted Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, with whom I had filmed a rather fun charcoal burning and birch sap wine tapping scene on his Cook on the Wild Side series, the predecessor to his various River Cottage programmes. I knew he had his own film company and wondered if he would help. Hugh told me that I should contact Grand Designs. Not having a TV at the time, I did not know what Grand Designs was. (For anyone reading who is in the same position, Grand Designs is a long-running Channel 4 documentary series on people building or having built their dream homes, presented by Kevin McCloud.) Hugh mentioned he was going to be at a party at the weekend and would run into some of the producers from Grand Designs. He said he would put in a word for me.

  True to his word he did just that and the following week I was contacted by Grand Designs about my project. A couple of weeks later we were filming. I think it helped that I knew nothing about Grand Designs, otherwise I might have questioned working on the programme with them. But, not having seen an episode until the programme on the ‘Woodland House’ was broadcast, I naively proceeded. I believe that not knowing what to expect helped maintain a relaxed atmosphere during the filming process. I remember the first piece I filmed, when Kevin McCloud asked me when it would be finished and I told him I would have to be in by winter. After all, my caravan would not survive as accommodation for another year. I think those words stayed with me and helped me to project-manage the build, with that timescale as my over-riding and necessary aim. Although TV cameras can occasionally hold up progress, Grand Designs were very professional – Fiona, who directed the programme, and Nicole, who coordinated with me throughout, were great fun to have around. I enjoyed their company and I hope they enjoyed the whole experience as well. I doubt there are many TV crews who immediately understood that when they arrived at Prickly Nut Wood their first job was to break up some twigs, light the fire and get the kettle on. Nicole quickly picked up the skills. I knew the house I was building was unique and different, but to get the build filmed and put a message across to the mainstream via TV was an opportunity to profile sustainable building, forest management and so much of what I believe is vital for the future, as well as helping other eco-builders find a niche and gain wider acceptance for their work.

  I had designed my build around a sweet chestnut cruck-frame barn, with lower-pitched roundwood box frames coming off the main aisle. I chose straw bales for my walling. Straw bales are an agricultural by-product and have such good insulation value they are an obvious choice. They complement a roundwood frame, as their depth – once lime-plastered – gives them the look of a solid stone wall. I’ve been intrigued by all aspects of lime plaster for years: the process of lime burning, the slightly macabre proposition of slaked lime and the wonderful breathability of the product, so vastly superior to modern-day concrete. (Concrete was a backwards step in building evolution, with so many buildings suffering where the use of concrete has trapped moisture – with lime it would have been able to escape and dry out.) I spent an interesting couple of days down in North Devon, where I attended a lime course with Mike Wye. The course was excellent in gaining the necessary confidence to proceed. So much of life is about confidence, and building a house (when you’ve never done it before) and having it filmed
for TV needs a good amount of confidence.

  I had planned on running the build using a large volunteer workforce. This was a risk, but I believed it was also an opportunity to empower people, give them the confidence that they too can build a house. During the build I had over 90 volunteers, the majority of whom turned out through word of mouth. It was a good summer and the word got round that there was this interesting build going on in the woods and it was a great place to be. In retrospect, when I am asked what that summer was like, I describe it thus: ‘There was a carnival going on and in the background we put up a building.’ As the project progressed I became more confident in my powers of delegation, and although the finished article carries a number of imperfections, there is a story to each one. When I sit by the fire and survey the timber frame I can remember who cut the tenons on the wall plates and why one on the veranda is a little rough – she had never held a chisel before. Although far from perfect, her work is good enough and I remember her every time I sit on the veranda and notice the imperfection. I hope she went back to Australia and built her own house as she planned. I look at the clay walls and I remember the hands that smoothed them over. This house is full of stories, full of people, and is built the way all houses should be built, by a community of people for a purpose.

  The build began in early May, but I had prepared a lot of timber beforehand. I had felled larch trees from the plantation in the woods and with a mobile sawmill converted them into floor joists, roof rafters and stud work. I had also milled the oak from some of the thinned standards in the coppice into waney-edged boarding for the cladding. Other boards were sent away to be kiln dried in preparation for being turned into floorboards. I had felled some ash, which I had cleaved into two halves and then worked down with a side axe the previous year. This I took to Tim Boxley’s workshop in nearby Heyshott, where we machined it to the appropriate size. I left it with Tim to join together to create the window frames. The chestnut shingles were cleft out and in bundles, ready to be pre-drilled for nailing to the roof with copper clout nails. The straw bales had been baled the previous year and were sitting in a barn, where they were compressing and settling. The lime was made into putty and ready to mix. All of these activities were carefully marked on the flipchart sheets on the wall of my leaky caravan.

  The sweet chestnut poles were all felled and piled up in the clearing near to the construction site. I colour-coded and marked them all for their appropriate use within the construction of the timber frame, and the process of peeling them was ongoing throughout the build. When a volunteer first arrived I would start them off on pole peeling. Partly because we had a lot of poles to peel, but also as it is a low-skilled job in which a volunteer will gain confidence and succeed in his or her task. It would give me time to assess their skill level and give them time to settle into the ambience of the project in the woods.

  The foundation stones I had collected from all around the parish. It is amazing how many people have a few York stone slabs at the end of the garden when you ask. I put the word out on the local grapevine that I needed foundation pad stones and over 40 stones turned up. Not wanting to use any concrete, I based my foundations upon pits filled with compacted sandstone from a local quarry and then placed a levelled York stone slab on top. The building then sat on top of the stones. This is a design I have continued to use on subsequent buildings. The only changes I have made are to place a piece of slate between the bottom of the pole and the York stone slab, which is then trimmed to the profile of the bottom of the pole, and to paint the bottom of the pole with a natural asphalt product – basically wood tar – to seal the end grain of the pole. These two additions improve the protection of contact between the pole and the foundation stone.

  As well as ensuring all materials were sourced and prepared, there was the bureaucratic side of the building to sort out. Getting planning permission was one part of the building process, but building regulations threw up another range of problems to overcome. My foundations needed to be justified by an engineer, as did the timber frame design I was using. This, of course, added to the expected cost of the tight budget I was working with. I had already cut all the timber poles so I had to await the engineer’s verdict. As I expected, all the poles I had cut were judged suitable for the timber frame I was building. Having engaged John Rees to submit my drawings, I now used his experience to deal with the building-control questions, while I concentrated on building the house.

  I worked on the foundations with Stuart Cameron, an experienced digger operator who lives in the village. Stuart dug out the holes and I back-filled them with rubble and compacted them using a ‘Jumping Jack’ whacker. This vibrating whacker is the most suitable tool for compacting in a small area and, although unpleasant to use, it does an excellent job. I then levelled each pad stone on top of the compacted stone and within two days my foundations were complete. Using a builder’s level I could then survey all the stones, working out the difference in millimetres between each of them and adjusting the height of each pole of the frame accordingly as it was constructed.

  The next main job was peeling the main framing poles. Once we had a reasonable number peeled, we constructed a framing bed. A framing bed is a level platform upon which the frames of the house are made. It is constructed by digging short poles into the ground and then fixing cross members at regular intervals to form a level bed. I used 6-inch by 2-inch larch timbers to form the cross members, which then became floor joists once the framing bed was finished with. By using the framing bed as a map with all the key positions marked onto it, it is possible to joint a frame, remove it and then start on the next frame by using the marks on the framing bed to create a mirror image of the first frame. With all the timber for the mainframes peeled and jointed, the raising day approached.

  The raising of my house at Prickly Nut Wood was the first of many raises that I have undertaken and since that first raise, as with many parts of our building technique, we have refined the process. There is something truly satisfying about raising a house with a hand winch, ropes and human labour. This unique practice has become part of the fascination with roundwood timber framing. Traditionally, all timber frames would have been raised this way in the days before cranes, and what pleasure and sense of satisfaction does a crane bring? Will we be able to maintain and run machines such as cranes in a world with diminishing oil supplies? Raising days are exciting – they are the big moment early in the build. All the work that has taken place on the framing bed now appears in front of you, and the skeleton of the building stands up. It is also an occasion when everyone wants to be involved, and people can often become quite overexcited. Which makes the focus of the day all the more intense.

  My role in these raises is to keep everyone focused. The raise itself is like a military operation. Everyone has an assigned task and knows their job; I limit the numbers, give a clear briefing and the raise goes on in silence. In our modern world of obsession over health and safety, in which adventure and risk are being bred out of our consciousness, it is all the more pleasurable to raise timber frame buildings this way, even if the risk assessment and method statement I have to submit takes almost as long to put together as jointing a frame! The satisfaction gained from frame raising – and the usual party and celebration which follows – are part of the joy of building we seem to have lost. If you travel the globe, you will find many cultures in which building a house is an important part of community life, and many friends and family members will come and help with house-building tasks. We seem to have lost the celebration and bringing together of community that house building brings. We seem to have lost the personal touch, and perhaps only self-build projects in the UK retain some of these elements. One practice we carry on at the roundwood timber-framing company is to encourage house owners to winch up their own house. This makes the project so much more real and makes the client, who has contracted us to build a house for them, more aware and engaged in the process. When, eventually, they live in the house,
they can sit back proudly and say, ‘I raised this house.’

  During the build of the woodland house I fed large numbers of volunteers. I did most of the cooking myself, as it seemed right to cook for those who were helping me to build my house. After a good meal we would often walk through the woods to the Lickfold Inn, where the social side of our building experience erupted into evenings of laughter.

  I would be up before six the next morning. I was sleeping on a wooden platform in the chestnut tree above the outdoor kitchen, so waking early was never a problem. I would light the outdoor kitchen fire, get the kettle on and make the first pot of coffee. That early-morning space before others had risen was my essential thinking time; it was how I planned the day, and it is a space I still value. Early on a summer’s morning, kettle on the fire, surveying the woodland scene, no one to interrupt my thoughts – the perfect way to start the day.

  The build progressed smoothly over the summer, and the help from volunteers ebbed and flowed. TV filming continued steadily, but as the summer nights began to draw in and the sense of autumn approached I felt a quickening within me. This feeling is one I relate to instinct, going back to the time of a more basic hunter–gatherer lifestyle. Many species are affected in different ways by the changes in the seasons and the reduction of daylight. Migratory birds know it is time to fly south; domestic chickens moult and egg production slows down; sheep begin their oestrus cycle knowing it is the right time to become pregnant so that their lambs born in the spring have the best chance of survival and growing on to be able to face the following winter; and deciduous trees prepare to shed their leaves as their sap flow reduces. So is it any wonder that the coming of autumn affects us as well? To me, the feeling is one of urgency. Like squirrels gathering nuts for the oncoming winter, I need to be sure my firewood is stacked and dry, and I am prepared for and have comfortable shelter for the winter ahead. This urgency was particularly keen during the building of my house, as my diary reveals.