As you know from my first post, it was my vision to create a sustainable home that was in tune with nature using Cob/Straw Bale. I have been keeping my options and mind open to any concepts that would help me achieve my goal of being in tune with nature.
I have been playing around with the house design and decided a few days ago to create it around the Sri Yantra.

Using the outer “square” as the garden perimeter. Most likely made of Cob with flowering and fruiting vines. The inner part of the wall would include permaculture and edible gardens.

Maybe even utilizing colored glass in the wall design …

I knew the house itself would be round. And the center, where the triangles are, would be domed.

It would have lots of natural light and the kitchen would be an integral part.

That’s about what I had in mind as I drove up to Asheville to take a look at some property. I had contacted an architect that morning, that dealt with sustainable materials in their design. My original call was to find locations that would allow alternative housing to help me narrow my search locations. Tim Callahan of Alembic Studio ( http://alembicstudio.com/ )agreed to meet with me that evening. I had not shared my design ideas as yet with anyone, and so Tim was under the impression that I was seeking locations to build a cob/straw bale home.
When I showed him the design and explained my ideas and my budget 🙂 …his first response was to tell me about Permanent Yurts. I had not heard of permanent yurts…I had researched yurts and knew them to be made of fabric…like an oversized tent…in simple terms that is.

I had researched them as they fell within my budget but it hadn’t jumped out at me as being in line with my vision. I knew it met the round requirements, but didn’t think there would be much flexibility in the design…especially now with the new design I envision.
Tim told me about Copperwaite Yurts. Bill Copperwaite is a guy in Maine who built a wooden yurt. He tried to explain the wall structure and how different it was from a regular yurt. How levels could be created, etc.
Eventually Tim pulled up the images online for me to see what he was thinking about…

I was in awe! Here was a design that was round, could be built into layers and have a look like a blossoming flower. The center yurt could still utilize the domed look for the triangles and the walls could include windows all around to allow in the natural light.

He further went on to describe an indoor/outdoor kitchen that would open up to one of the edible gardens. He said given the weather in the region, having that option to open the kitchen up to the outdoors would be perfect.

Keep in mind the photos are ideas to build around.

But I was grinning from ear to ear at this point…Grinning more at how things had fallen into place so quickly once I had changed my design vision and goal. Most, if not all designs I had found that were based on the Sri Yantra were temples and very ornate or like the Pyramids…but again not suiting my purposes. So imagine my excitement when I made a decision to do this, have a meeting the same day that I was to look at property, and end up having a discussion and design ideas that fell into line with what I had been tinkering with.
I’m going with it was meant to be…and I’m following it 🙂