Tree Houses

Terunobu Fujimori, Teahouse Tetsu, Kiyoharu Shirakaba Museum,
Nakamaru, Hokuto City, Yamanashi (Japan). Photo from the book
Tree Houses. Fairy Tale Castles in the Air by PhilipJodidio
 



Please photo credit Blue Forest Treehouses

Google images of “tree houses” and be prepared to re-imagine your adulthood. I want this one! It so happens that yesterday I was talking with my neighbor over the back fence. There are two young active boys in his household and another young boy next door. We were imagining tree houses and elevated bridges to get from a (yet-to-be-built) deck to a (yet-to-be-built) tree house and from one property to the neighbors so the kids could play together. Tree houses start as a childhood imagining and sometimes follow us into our adult lives. The common denominator is creating spaces nurtured by nature and reveling in a different view of the world—in the air instead of on the ground. Tree houses are the direct opposite of hobbit houses, which also have their own appeal grounded in the earth as they are (it is fun to Google “hobbit house” images, too).

 

Take a tour of 50 amazing tree houses from around the world in the book Tree Houses. Fairy Tale Castles in the Air by PhilipJodidio. You will encounter “a teahouse, a restaurant, a hotel, a playhouse for children, or a perch from which to contemplate life—the tree house can take as many forms as the imagination can offer. In times of concern for sustainability and ecological responsibility, the tree house may also be the ultimate symbol of life in symbiosis with nature.”  Click here and here for more tree house photos.

 

Did you have a childhood tree house or have one now? Tell us about what made/makes it special.