In his retirement, walking the streets of Bordeaux, Montaigne wore a pewter medallion inscribed with the words Que sais-je? (“What do I know?”). – David Shield, Reality Hunger
Sometime late in my undergraduate studies, I saw an image online of a simple and beautiful pine chair that was made from prefab dimensional lumber from a hardware store. Its legs were 1 x 2’s; its frame, seat, and backrest were 1 x 8’s; and the whole chair was made with eleven pieces of wood, cut to six different lengths and assembled with nails and a hammer. At that time, I had no frame of reference for what this was, so I tracked down more information using mostly blogs and flickr accounts with conflicting information and unclear provenances. In this search, though, I stumbled on an architecture student’s blog and was able to download a PDF of a book of furniture plans called Autopregettazione?. The book was by the Italian Designer Enzo Mari and was a full suite of furnishings for the home that, in his words, sought to “teach anyone to look at present production with a critical eye.” The designs were free, under the condition that the maker wasn’t “a factory or a trader,” and the book itself was also free, under the condition that you mailed the designer enough postage to send you a copy.
I never made any of the furniture, but several years later, after much more tumult in my studio, I made the chair that I had seen years prior.
This process of identification and retrieval was far more riveting than the “work” that I was doing in my studio, so I started reading more about Enzo Mari and DIY Furniture. This process organically led me to the work of Ken Isaacs, Victor Papanek, and others. As I found out about these books, I began to collect them. It started off with a few, perhaps found at a used bookstore or at a yard sale, but in the last two years it’s become a more defined and intentional form of collecting.
I have begun to refer to this project as “The Self Determination Library.” It is an incomplete and idiosyncratic collection based around empowering people to alter their manmade milieu. Presently, it ranges from standard DIY manuals like Enzo Mari’s, to more architecture-based texts Like Christopher Alexander’s “Yellow Books” (A Pattern Language, The Timeless Ways of Building), to books more rooted in the counterculture, like Sim Van Der Ryn’s Integral Urban House and texts on experimental and communal building practices like Ken Kern’s books Owner Build Home and The Code, as well as books concerned with lofts and urban living, like Jim Stratton’s Pioneering in The Urban Wilderness, and historical texts that concern communal living, the counter culture of the 1960s and their greater context, like Hugh Gardner’s Children of Prosperity.
Below I have listed a bibliography of many of the books from my collection. They are not essential readings, but more personal selections. My collection is not exhaustive, although I am constantly adding to it. It is more of a controlled burn than an encyclopedia. One text has led to the next, or sometimes they just appear out of the footnotes, while others are buried in a box somewhere. The whole endeavor is based on the element of surprise, and the difficulty of finding many of these books is perhaps what fuels the mania behind the collection. In an increasingly digital world, there is something inexplicably refreshing about the unplanned and organic growth of this project, and how new titles and ideas are constantly appearing from the bowels of footnotes and bibliographies and offhand suggestions by friends and acquaintances.
“We forget that doing it IS a pleasure.” – Spiros Zakas, More Furniture in 24 Hours
How-To Manuals:
Bruvere, Christian, and Inwood, Robert. In Harmony with Nature. Philadelphia: Running Press, 1973.
EOOS. Social Furniture. London: Koenig Books, 2016.
Fineder, Martina, and Geisler, Thomas, and Hackenschmidt, Sebastian. Nomadic Furniture 3.0. Zurich: Niggli Verlag, 2017.
Hennessey, James, and Papanek, Victor J. Nomadic Furniture. New York: Pantheon Books, 1973.
Hennessey, James, and Papanek, Victor J. Nomadic Furniture 2. New York: Pantheon Books, 1974.
Isaacs, Ken. How to Build Your Own Living Structures. New York: Harmony Books, 1974.
Kern, Ken. The Owner Built Home. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1972.
Kern, Ken, and Kogon, Ted, and Thallon, Rob. The Owner-Builder and The Code. Oakhurst: Owner-Builder Publications, 1976.
Mari, Enzo. Autoprogettazione?. Milan, 1974.
Reynolds, Michael. Earthship: Volume I. Taos: Solar Survival Press, 1990.
Reynolds, Michael. Earthship: Volume II. Taos: Solar Survival Press, 1990.
Reynolds, Michael. Earthship: Volume III. Taos: Solar Survival Press, 1993.
Stamberg, Peter. Instant Furniture. New York: Litton Educational Publishing, 1976.
Stem, Seth. Designing Furniture from Concept to Shop Drawing: a Practical Guide. Newtown: Tauton Press, 1989.
Stratton, Jim. Pioneering in The Urban Wilderness. New York: Urizen Books, 1977.
Zakas, Spiros. More Furniture in 24 Hours. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1978.
Zakas, Spiros. Furniture in 24 Hours. New York: Macmillan Publishing, 1976.
Theory/History:
Alexander, Christopher. The Timeless Way of Building. New York: Oxford University Press, 1979.
Alexander, Christopher. A Pattern Language. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977.
Alexander, Christopher. The Oregon Experiment. New York: Oxford University Press, 1975.
Alexander, Christopher. The Production of Houses. New York: Oxford University Press, 1985.
Alexander, Christopher. Notes on the Synthesis of Form. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1964.
Blinkey, Sam. Getting Loose. Durham: Duke University Press, 2007.
Boal, Iain, and Stone, Janferie, and Watts, Michael, and Winslow, Cal, ed. West of Eden: Communes and Utopia in Northern California. Oakland: PM Press, 2012.
Brand, Stewart. How Buildings Learn. New York: Penguin Books, 1994.
Gardener, Hugh. The Children of Prosperity. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1978.
Habrakken, John. Supports: An Alternative to Mass Housing. London: The Architecture Press, 1972.
Halprin, Lawrence. The RSVP Cycles. New York: Braziller, 1969.
Hamdi, Nabeel. Housing Without Houses: Participation, Flexibility, Enablement. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1991.
Hayden, Dolores. Seven American Utopias. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1976.
Kahn, Lloyd, and Easton, Bob. Shelter. Bolinas: Shelter Publications, 1973.
Oliver, Paul, ed. Shelter and Society. London: Barrie & Jenkins, 1969.
Papanek, Victor. Design for the Real World. New York: Bantam Books, 1973.
Soleri, Paolo. Arcosanti: an Urban Laboratory?. Scottsdale: Cosanti Press, 1983.
Turner, John F.C. Housing by People. New York: Pantheon Books, 1976.
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Sam Winks is an artist and designer living and working in Ridgewood, Queens. He earned his MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University and his BFA from the Savannah College of Art and Design. Winks’s work has been included in group shows and video screenings throughout New York and Virginia, and he has had solo exhibitions at The Lumberyard in Marfa, Texas, and The Anderson Gallery in Richmond, Virginia.
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