Haystack Book Talk: Building Local Building Green

Brian Donahue, author of Slow Wood: Greener Building from Local Forests, talks with Great Mountain Forest’s Mike Zarfos about the connection between American houses and local woodlands.

American homes are typically made of lumber and plywood delivered by a global system of ruthless extraction, or of concrete and steel, which are even worse for the planet. Wood is often the most sustainable material for building, but we need to protect diverse forests as much as we desperately need more houses.

Donahue and Zarfos will talk about the relationship between humans and forests through responsible, sustainable use of local and regional wood in home building and offer a blueprint and stewardship plan for how to live more responsibly with the woods; they will suggest a sustainable approach to both forestry and building centered on tightly connected ecological and social values.

Donahue documented his experiences building a timber frame home from the wood growing on his family farm, practicing “worst first” forestry. Through the stories of the trees he used (sugar maple, black cherry, black birch, and hemlock), and some he didn’t (white pine and red oak), they will discuss and explore the history of Americans’ relationship with their forests.

Brian Donahue is professor emeritus of American Environmental Studies at Brandeis University. He is a farmer, historian, and conservationist, and the author of prize-winning books about the past and future of New England farms and forests.

Mike Zarfos is the executive director of Great Mountain Forest. He holds a BA in biology and global studies from Colby College, an MA in international relations from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University and a Ph.D. in conservation biology from SUNY Environmental Science and Forestry (ESF).

Zarfos has also led research teams studying bird and plant communities on seabird islands in the Gulf of Maine with National Audubon, in the salt marshes around Long Island Sound with UConn, and in the beech-maple-birch forests of the Adirondack Mountains.

“Beautiful, insightful, and written for the ages, Slow Wood asks us to stop seeing the woods as a warehouse for future two by fours or a living painting. Instead, Brian Donahue asks us to use trees as the best way to know them, appreciate them, and conserve them.”—Steven Stoll, author of Ramp Hollow: The Ordeal of Appalachia

“Brian Donahue makes a passionate and innovative case for the responsible use of forests as a place to ground a sustainable future.”—Nancy Langston, author of Climate Ghosts and Sustaining Lake Superior

Haystack Book Talks in Norfolk, CT, a production of the Norfolk Hub, brings together writers and thinkers in unmoderated conversation. The Haystack Book Festival takes place the first weekend in October at the Norfolk Library.