Ken Kern was an architect who published a series of books in the 1970s starting with the classic The Owner-Built Home, and followed by The Owner-Built Homestead, The Owner-Builder and the Code, and The Work Book. The last, written with his sister Evelyn Turner, a psychologist, is a case study of people who built their own homes and the effect it had on their lives. Stewart Brand reviewed it in The Whole Earth Catalog. “About 80 percent of the couples I know who have built a house or a boat, they build it, then they split up,” Brand wrote. “Happened to me too.” I was concerned about that, since my wife and I were building our own house (that was 1977—we’re still together). I referred to The Owner-Built Home a lot. It is full of practical advice about building techniques, materials, tools, and contains useful references, many of them arcane such as where to get a soil-cement block press, for example or a squat toilet (Kern travelled the globe after graduating from architecture school). I never met him but we corresponded. According to John Raabe, who worked for Kern, the architect-builder died (in the mid 1990s) in one of his own creations. He had just fnished building an experimental dome using slip-formed concrete, and decided to spend a night in it. There was a freak rain storm, and the dome collapsed on its hapless creator. The perils of owner-building.
I and my wife built a concrete home mostly designed by Ken Kern, a great man. Our home is a 50ft. dia. double wall construction. A great home for the poor. You can build as you can afford it and it does not lose value from not being finished. We built this home in Texas and would have lost three homes to bad finances if we had bought regular homes, down turns in the markets being the reason. Our walls are almost 12ins. high and would not take long to build if you have the money to fund. We were dirt poor. I did find work and kept it going. Still have not finished it today, because I never made much money, but I own a house with valve.
Thanks Witold!
His books made a huge impression on me, when I was just out of engineering school, thirty some years ago. One of the things I remember was that he had a chart comparing the pullout strength of various types of nails, ring shanked being the best.
I was sad to hear of how he passed on, but he leaves a good legacy.
Also, I have enjoyed your books, thanks. I told somebody about the small house book just the other day.
Lou
Well written and well-informed article/review. Ken was my grandfather (dad’s dad) and his legacy and values continue on within the family. My father has adopted his passion and his work and since I was able to lift a rock I have done the same and will continue to do so and pass on to my one-year oild who already helps alongside the job sites 🙂
Brenna, I worked with Ken for many years, but don’t know you. Who was your father then? Not Hanzel or Joe, who then?
Thanks, Michael
My father is Joe. He moved up to British Columbia with my mom in the late 80’s and continues to work stone masonry here to this day.
Thanks Witold,
Ken helped me with telephone calls and correspondence when I was doing my Architecture Thesis on Self Help Housing, he turned me on to “Architecture without Architects” and most profoundly to “Hundertwasser’s Housing Manifesto” which Ken made up from the “Mould Manifesto”. He was one of my mentors. I still think of him often, particularly some of his observations in “The Healthy House”.
As a result of Ken Kern’s guidance, I published “Self Help Solar Housing – Design and Construction Manual for Acadia House” in 1979.
I know for sure over 500 versions of Acadia House were designed & built & modified by owner-builders for themselves as a first house and many of them went on to help others with their housing needs allowing them to share the joy of personal housing independence and the confidence that they can rely on themselves for things they thought only ‘experts’ could do; and, as a result of this new found freedom and independence they all have gained life full of confidence and creative energy.
THANK YOU KEN KERN!
Yours truly, Charles.
the world was deprived of a great intelligence and very good-hearted spirit when we lost Mr. Ken Kern. Though he is largely or almost completely unrecognized ( see skimpy wikipedia article which merely lists his books), because he did much of his work in the rarefied atmosphere of home-built shelter in the 70’s, both before the real advent of the internet and before the advent of DYI shows on cable. Ken Kern anticipated the housing crisis and traveled the world seeking out low-cost solutions for owner-builders. His books were exceedingly well thought out and presented an array of options and concerns
to anyone considering building their own dwelling. His ideas remain relevant and I suggest that any builder would be well served to peruse and to draw from all the thinking and good design ideas that he pioneered. The world would be better off if we observed some of the things that he tried to tell us.
I, not Stewart Brand, wrote the review of The Work Book published in the Whole Earth Catalog.
I tried to follow in Ken’s footsteps helping owner builders design and building their own homes. Built my own with only $2000 in paid labor in the nid-1970s and chaired a Santa Cruz County Committee to reform the code to enable owner building. It seemed to me that everything that made sense was illegal.
Ken’s self-published The healthy House (1978) changed the course of my career from helping owner builders design and build their own homes to trying to learn what characterizes a healthy home. Ken gave me the tapes he used to write the book and told me he was through with the topic and i was free to pursue it. I was hired by UC Berkeley as a researcher later that year and have been trying to learn what makes a healthy house ever since then Still trying.
Ken was the first person I know of to use the term ‘humusphere’. I have been involved in light industrial compost making for most of my life, and the idea of the correctness of this notion has remained with me all these years. This year the Earth has lost billions of tonnes of stored sunlight in the form of the forest fuel overburden, which all could have been made into premium humus, as well as endless quantities of methane to provide the fuel for processing organic waste from the forests and scrublands. Friend Sykes said, almost one hundred years ago, that one day it would be a criminal offence to burn a single straw. Fifty years later, Masanobu Fukuoka based a revolution in agriculture on one straw. Even before Sykes, Sir Albert Howard had stated that fertility (humus) is the greatest and most powerful tool in the armory of democracy.
We am just now downsizing after 38 years in our house.
Going through the bookshelf I found myself holding the Owner Built Home.
I bought it in 1972 when we were living in Aspen CO.
I was a guy with no knowledge of building anything. Ken’s ideas set me down the righteous path.
We ended up spending the past 38 years restoring a 100 yr old, hewn cedar log home, off the grid.
Every project benefited in some way from Ken’s ideas and wisdom. Or simply from his attitude.
I would have loved to have met him. He really impacted my life.
RIP
I am rereading Ken Kern’s book and enjoy it once again. Joan and I built our circular house in the 1980s, finishing in 1987. We enjoyed the building and even more the follow-on living in it. Joan died three years ago and I still live here and very determined to be here when I die. Despite reading The Owner-built House, our house is largely of conventional carpentry despite the circular shape. I would gladly do it all over again.
ken kern must have been an interesting man. i read some of his books. i am impressed by his work. i think we need more knowledge-information on sustainable-cost-effective housing out there.