The Touchwood Project

Since we live on the beach, we’ve long eyed up the swaying fronds of bladderwrack, kelp and dulse seaweed — both as free wild food, and as a cheap home spa treatment. Today we and our cats braved the miserable weather to harvest some seaweed because it’s the spring low tide, meaning that the tide is out further than at almost any other time of the year — perfect for gathering fresh seaweed…. Read the rest of this article >>

Today we caravanned along the road to check out the first straw bale house being built on Orkney. Our interest is both personal, as a home for ourselves, and for Touchwood, as potential accommodation eco-cottages. I have to say, it’s a strong contender in the quest to find the best eco-friendly, locally available and enduring building material. Nick Morrison and Amazonails… Read the rest of this article >>

If you know what you’re naturally good at, and do that every day, you are 300% more likely to be successful in your work and have a better quality of life. That’s according to research conducted by Gallup of over 10 million people over the past 30 years. Out of these findings, they’ve developed StrengthsFinder, an online survey to assess your top 5 “strengths” out of 34 different possibilities. What we’re… Read the rest of this article >>

I have this photo on my wall as inspiration for the kind of accommodation I’d like to build for Touchwood, if we build an eco lodge. I’m thinking 6 or so of these, to house 2 – 6 people each. Simon Dale and his wife built this house for £3,000 and 1500 hours of labour in some woodland in Wales a few years ago. Aside from the inviting architecture, the idea of building housing that doesn’t cost a fortune is… Read the rest of this article >>