Mr. Phillips on the bridge to the Tree House
What? Yes. A dozen+ homes in Huntsville, Texas defy your imagination. Built by Dan Phillips, a very creative entrepreneur, designer and builder makes use of the waste of our building industry and gets deep about the impact of perception on our choices (esp. at 4:56). In his witty, insightful, 17-minute TED Talk, Phillips demonstrates two ways of thinking he says are most common in building and design: Apollonian and Dionysian. The former being the dominant and, inherently a “perfection”-driven model, is primarily responsible for the mountains of construction waste in our landfills. If something’s scratched, nicked or otherwise imperfect, it ends up in a landfill. Dionysian design and thinking, on the other hand, is more intuitive and flexible, he says. It expresses a poetry and pragmatism to building that solves the issue of construction waste. Simply put, he builds houses out of trash. Lovely houses. Inexpensive and lovely houses.
His is a socio-economic and environmental mission. A New York Times article, from 2009, paints a portrait of the man himself. Possessing a varied background that will likely surprise you, Mr. Phillips began his construction company, Phoenix Commotion, in 1997, with the intent to create affordable homes from salvaged materials. He figured it was a 2 birds, 1 stone kind of deal. Use whatever he could from the waste stream, usually gotten for free or cheap, and create stable housing for those who could otherwise not afford home-ownership. Despite many successes, even some of his homes were lost to foreclosure by the buyers. With mortgage payments ranging from only $99-$300 per month, he says, “you can put someone in a new home but you can’t give them a new mindset”. Ironically, these foreclosed homes quickly sold to higher-income buyers, who valued their energy efficiency and unique look. The gentrification of Phoenix Commotion homes doesn’t sit perfectly well with Dan Phillips, but he says if it helps to further the idea of creative reuse, he’s ok with it. And while he’s not getting rich on this business, it has become profitable.
Dan Phillips is a beacon for sensible, creative re-use and the DIY-spirit in general. We Portlanders (and many others) are lucky to have places like the ReBuilding Center and the Habitat for Humanity ReStore. We don’t have to dig in landfills to find gems and these businesses have found ways to eliminate that middle-man altogether by making a business of “Deconstruction”. But that’s a subject for another blog post. 
Check out Mr. Phillips’ website, watch the TED Talk and read the Times article, all linked above. Be inspired … and share some of your thoughts here!
