A Short Review of Slow Wood: Greener Building From Local Forests, by Brian Donahue
Robert Bly, in describing Walden, wrote, it was “as if each page were a chunk of maple.” I sense he meant rock maple, as opposed to soft maple, complimenting the heft and solidity of Thoreau’s words. In Slow Wood: Greener Building from Local Forests, Brian Donahue’s tightly constructed and well-thought-out sentences mirror most accurately the characteristics of the somewhat under appreciated though nevertheless beautiful and practical black birch — one of the several tree species he chronicles throughout his treatise on the virtues of sustainable forestry and ecological building practices.
Donahue’s narrative blends the genres of memoir, environmental history, and “how-to” manifesto. The core of the book revolves around the construction of the timber frame home he and his family, along with numerous carpenters and craftspeople, constructed from trees harvested from their farm-woodlot property. In the early 2000’s, they jointly purchased this land in western Massachusetts with friends, Tom and Joan, in conjunction with a conservation covenant.
Though originally from Pittsburgh, PA, Donahue has lived and worked most of his life in New England, and co-founded Land’s Sake, a community non-profit farm and forest organization in Weston, MA. As part of this program, he initiated training that introduced youth to forestry skills through firewood processing within town forests: “There wasn’t much logging going on in eastern Massachusetts… Instead of wanting to see less logging, or no logging, I came to think there should be more logging: in fact, I soon became a suburban logger myself.”
Years of hands-on labor, as well as observing, teaching, and writing about environmental history (Donahue taught at Brandeis University and is still professor emeritus there) laid the groundwork for a mature and responsible stewardship of their newly acquired 170 acres. These perspectives also heavily influenced the design and building aspects of their timber frame house. Returning to black birch, which they incorporated primarily as flooring (but also in kitchen cabinet panels, baseboard, and trim), Donahue writes, “Step One: cut the worst first. Step Two: sell the best of what you cut, keep the rest to build your house… because as Yankees we believe that frugality builds character.”
Undergirding Slow Wood is deftly articulated support for sustainable silviculture based within local economies. Donahue advocates for the trickle-down benefits employed through such approaches, championing the numerous professions associated within the wood products industry: foresters, loggers, mill operators, timber-framers, and carpenters, among others. He also describes how traditional techniques such as timber framing are gaining wider usage and appeal alongside modern technologies such as cross laminated timber (CLT), which allow wood-based structural framing to remain visible in finished structures. Such design approaches enhance the realization and appreciation that link natural resources with our living and working spaces.
To me, perhaps the most powerful message conveyed by Donahue occurs in the chapter highlighting the interior stairs they built from sugar maple felled from their property. Here he speaks of the vital difference between simply gazing at a beautiful forest as opposed to physically working in the woods, and the intrinsic value gained from such an experience: “When we call the trees by name and look through the wall of green, the woods open and become three dimensional in space… But when we step through the door and work in the woods, they open to us in four directions, including time, if we are paying attention… backward and forward.” Slow Wood is a hearty read, best savored during wood stove season, and deeply appropriate now, when more and more of us live in urban and suburban locales and direct contact with the natural world seems to be diminishing with each passing generation.