Homegrown Melodies

There’s a thriving music scene on Bowen Island; a variety of cafes offer drop-in and open mic events, such the popular Snug Session that brings live celtic music to the Snug Cafe on Saturday nights, from 7 to 10pm.

This Friday the Happy Isle cafe, just down the hill from us, will offer live jazz from 7:30pm - 11:00pm with Bowen’s own Teun Schut, Buff Allen, and Ryland Haggis. The trio will play selections from Pat Metheny, John Scofield, Michael Brecker, and George Benson. Fill your glass, join our community, and enjoy these intimate shows.

For full listings of all the musical events out here in the Salish Sea, check out the brand-new Music On Bowen site.

“The Most Comfortable Bed on the Island”

We recently hosted the delightful Monique Trottier (self-portrait at left) and her partner. By day, Monique co-owns a Vancouver-based internet consulting firm; and by evening she is a perfumist and blogger who writes about Canadian literature and the publishing biz. Last summer, Monique reviewed my memoir Almost Green, which tells the colorful story of how I built The Eco-Shed. And last night, she “reviewed” the suite on So Misguided, her blog.

“Having read the book, I knew that I wasn’t going to sleep over in some drafty garden shed,” she writes. “But I had no concept of how lovely the eco-shed really is.”

Check out the piece and her photos, one of which features “the most comfortable beds on the island.”

And by the way, we invite future or past guests to share and ‘tag’ their photos with “eco-shed” as Monique has done, so that we can check them out and perhaps add them to our group pool on Flickr.

A Lush Oasis

We planted the garden around The Eco-Shed last spring, and now that everything is more or less established, the place is currently exploding with life. Not too much food yet aside from the greens in the cold frames, the rhubarb, and some early broccoli rabe. The bees are furiously working the berry patches. The strawberries in particular have gone nuts; we’ll expect and encourage guests to browse the patch at will when the fruit appears in a few weeks.

As I write this from inside the Eco-Shed, we’re enjoying an invigorating spring rain. The rain isn’t loud on the steel roof above because there is more than a foot of spray-foam insulation between us. All that water up there is flowing down and through a pipe that travels underground through the garden, and empties into a 2,800-gallon cistern, or storage tank.

Later in the summer, when the sun is out and the plants are thirsty, we’ll pump that water, under pressure, back up to the garden. And here’s where you’ll see the results:

My Eco-Shed’s Secret Double Life

Fun fact: When guests are not enjoying themselves inside The Eco-Shed, I use the space as a writing studio. It’s a perfect place to be productive because it is so calm and peaceful. Of course, I’m not the only one with a garden creative retreat. A thriving subculture of home-office workers is thriving over in the United Kingdom and elsewhere; they call themselves (are you ready for this?) “sheddies.”

Recently, Alex Johnson—chief shed officer for shedworking.co.uk—contacted me and told me that my studio was up for a Shed of the Year Award. Provided you feel we’re worthy of this esteemed title, hop over the pond and give us your vote!

Smart Growth = Green Growth

With a jazz soundtrack and bold graphics, this three-minute clip reveals the links between the principals of smart growth and climate change. It won a video contest organized by The Congress for New Urbanism. Credits: filmmaker John Paget,  First+Main Media (Drew Ward, Chris Elisara and John Paget).

Green Building, Circa 1898

Recently I had an opportunity to tour the newly restored Flack Block in downtown Vancouver. The building, built at the end of the 19th century, features an innovative technique for carrying light into its basement–a strategy that today’s sustainable designers call “daylighting.” Check out how they did green before the age of extensive artificial lighting.

An Explosive Past

The Bowen Island Community Museum has just opened The History of Western Explosives Factory on Bowen Island, an exhibit about the dynamite plant that operated on an 850-acre lot on the west side of the island between 1909 and 1913.

The exhibit explores the history of dynamite manufacturing on Bowen, details the fatal accidents at the plant, displays pottery left behind by the dynamite plant workers, and offers a glimpse into the lives of the contract laborers engaged in this dangerous work.

At the museum building, located in the village at the crossroads. Spring hours are Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, between 10am and 3:30pm; hours increase in the summer.