Cabin Porn is one of our favorite blogs about architecture in the woods. It is based in NYC and curated by Zach Klein and Jace Cooke, et al. We check it out regularly for rustic design inspiration and were super surprised and happy when we came across our Rabbit Island project on it a few days ago. Andrew Ranville, the first Rabbit Island artist in residence, also found his ongoing Pumaja treehouse installation featured today. Thanks guys.
This is the most recent update of life and work on the island as told by Andrew Ranville who is on the island until the end of August. The rest of the update can be found on Kickstarter here. The wind has been kicking up on the lake recently from both the east and the west and the seaworthy boat we purchased while attempting to use our Kickstarter funds judiciously ended up having a lemon of a motor. Our economy had backfired. This was very disheartening.
We have been struggling to find a local used engine that will push our boat but in rural northern Michigan such things are hard to find on short notice. The other small aluminum fishing boat we have at our disposal “thinks it can” on Lake Superior but in the end can’t always be safely relied upon, especially on days when the winds are above 15 knots.
Island life has thus not been without frustrations. Good progress has been made, however, in spite of a few misfortunes and lessons have been learned. Success and basic settlement, ultimately, will be all the sweeter when it is finished.
Leave it as it is. You can not improve on it. The ages have been at work on it, and man can only mar it. What you can do is to keep it for your children, your children’s children, and for all who come after you, as one of the great sights which every American if he can travel at all should see.
We have gotten past the stage, my fellow-citizens, when we are to be pardoned if we treat any part of our country as something to be skinned for two or three years for the use of the present generation, whether it is the forest, the water, the scenery. Whatever it is, handle it so that your children’s children will get the benefit of it.“
-Theodore Roosevelt, 1903
Fine quote Teddy. (And great job with the parks.) But what if you were born in a suburb a century after this advice was given? It becomes rather obvious that contemporary society has no organized political or economic mechanism to undo things that have divided nature into a grid on a ecologically meaningful scale from the modern American google earth mosaic. There is not even a direct antonym to the word subdivision in the english language. This is, of course, in spite of the facts. We have made large steps forward intellectually and now have reason/science telling us that our environment is compromised from an ecosystem perspective. The design of such a mechanism and the success of it politically and economically, we believe, is one of the next great wheels that must be shaped and turned in our society. It is not an unreasonable idea.
Our historical westward land grab vastly outpaced our rational understanding of externalities since Europe landed in America and perhaps now society must be open to the idea that mistakes were made, and the corrolary to this idea, that such mistakes can be fixed. This would not necessarily imply conserving only remnant open spaces (i.e. Nature Conservancy) that were passed over by wagon trains and developers for one reason or another–climate, prohibitive topography, lack of minerals, great distance from population centers–but consciously and systematically reclaiming prime lands guided by reasonable principles and socially acceptable time frames amidst the parcelization that has filled the space between Manhattan, Michigan and beyond. It makes simple sense that there exist a market mechanism for making parcels of land rejoin to form larger contiguous units of open space for the sake of our culture, historical precedent, and long term benefit. (The Department of Ecosystems, perhaps, or, alternatively, a new model of collective philanthropy?) Historically there has been nothing but an asymetrical non-equilibrium of land use rooted in the perspective of the individual, which, if extrapolated to a distant endpoint, leaves extensive damage as can be illustrated in it's adolescent stages by scrolling across the country. One form of American tradition, capitalism, has indeed eroded another pillar of Americana; frontier.
Peter Buchanan-Smith of Best Made Co. in Tribeca created this special edition axe for Rabbit Island. It arrived in the mail in Laurium and when we opened the box our eyes lit up. It is the most beautiful axe we’ve ever seen. Over the last two weeks we put it to work on various wood cutting tasks around camp, not the least of which was clearing some windfallen pines from a trail we made heading north from camp along the shore. Next will be chopping a narrow path across the island from west to east from our camp to a large boulder covered in yellow lichen on the eastern shore we call mustard seat. This would allow us to shelter a boat on the lee side of the island during a strong westerly blow as well as give us a fine location to watch the sunrise. Once the basics of settling are done we will then be able to put the axe to work on finer items such as posts for construction, traditional hand-hewn beams and various furniture projects. Decisions as to which trees to take and which trees to keep (such as our young white pines we hope to foster into towering trees) will be bolstered by the fact that our felling tool is respectful of itself for it’s own sake.
The axe is beautiful and functional but what we like best about it is that it maintains an intrinsic connection to functional simplicity. It is an object that is very few degrees separated from nature as given and leaves little behind that is damaging should its usefulness ever fade. This is likely why it commands such a visceral response and this is why we love it. There are fine and honorable uses of technology and there are simple and lasting basic goods. There is also the conflicted middle ground. This is illustrated everywhere and in all markets (suburbia and subdivision is likely the prime example of such muddling on a social scale, big box products might be on a commercial scale). In the end simple things like axes and elegant engineering achievements like solar cells must coexist in the context of our modern world. In many ways this is the ethic of Rabbit Island and the root of what we will think about out there. Things need to be organized neatly. Things need to be curated rationally. Cheers to Peter and company for celebrating the basics by elevating a fine symbol of traditional constitution to an art.
Peter also sent us away with some shapemaker blocks which are pretty basic and beautiful. They too convey creativity and industry in a fundamentally simple form that will stand the test of time. There is very little externality to these babies which makes their value only increase with time.
Here is the start to the island library. So far themes include art, science, literature, americana, island life, maps, wood and stone working, adventure, preservation, and, well, Paris. Andrew did a bang up job with the bookshelves, no? Several more books are on their way via post and we’re working on rustling up the titles recommended via our FB page. If you have other suggestions see this related blog post or visit our Facebook.
Last night, at around 9pm, I found myself taking the quick fifteen minute trip from Houghton to Calumet. Chris Bathgate’s “Salt Year”, a pack of maverick 100s, and the abandoned mining buildings kept my company. I was on my way to meet with Dr. Rob Gorski from New York, who recently purchased a 90-acre island off the coast of the Keweenaw, and a sense of worry washed over me. I think native yoopers always get worried when someone from the city decides to start meddling with their turf. But, he wanted to grab a beer at Schute’s. At least he has good taste, right?
I’m only five steps into the building and I catch eyes with a man and woman at the bar.
“Steven?”
The next two hours seemed to go down faster than the beers in our hands as I listened to Rob talk about Rabbit Island, its geography, everything it took to get him here, his fascination with subdivision and the island’s complete lack of it, and his vision for the islands future. It didn’t take long for my northerner instincts to realize Rob has them too, and that, ultimately, we all want the best for the Keweenaw.
So what is Rob doing? Well, right now, at this moment as I type, he’s out on the island looking, planning, deciding. He intends to have anything that is built done so in a way that it can be undone without scarring the land in a day. Preservation rings loudly through the island’s beautiful and inspiring waves, forests, and wildlife, and Rob wants to harness all of those things to create a space for artists to go and experience the raw beauty of undivided, uninhabited, and (near entirely) undeveloped land.
So why do we care? Because it’s awesome. Rob has his head in the right place, and he’s doing something that could really help drive and inspire local creation. If everything goes according to plan, I will be heading out to the island a couple of times during the next few weeks shooting video of their construction process, Rob talking about the island, and hopefully even musicians performing out there.
-Steven Michael Holmes, www.mostlymidwest.com
**Update: Steven did end up making it out to the island along with several musicians who had just played Graham Parson's Farm Block Festival. The spontaneous quintet of guitar, fiddle, voice and percussion recorded a few tracks and some videos a la Vincent Moon on the rocks beside the lake as the sun got low. (Some photos: * * * * *) I can’t wait to see the video spots after Steven edits them and there is a 100% chance one of the audio recordings will be on the Rabbit Island Mixtape which is due out in the next few weeks featuring what else: northern Michigan music.
Have a look! Photographs from the end of July and early August out on Rabbit Island are right here.
Andrew sent word from the island yesterday that a northeast wind had kicked up on the lake making it impossible for him to get back to the mainland because of rough seas between camp and the peninsula three miles away. What would you have done? (This also illustrates well that when you are alone on an island you had best leave word of where you are heading… just in case.)