Birthday Book Recs 19/50 : House Lessons: Renovating a Life by Erica Bauermeister

Thoughts on Books

Dec 23

Birthday Book Recs: 19/50
House Lessons: Renovating a Life by Erica Bauermeister

I LOVE THIS BOOK SO MUCH.

If you have an interest in:

Home renovation,
Home on an esoteric + feely level,
Architecture,
PNW topography and geography,
Modern family life,
Writing/creativity…

THEN MAYBE YOU WILL LOVE IT SO MUCH TOO.

I feel like I mention this book a fair amount. Well, Oops!... I Did it Again. House Lessons came out at the beginning of Covid — how weirdly appropriate given that we were all sequestered in our homes. Upon learning of this memoir that chronicles the renovation of a kooky house in kooky Port Townsend, I ordered it tout de suite. And then over a year later, Erica Bauermeister (and Karen Karbo) joined me for a lovely virtual event called Modern Fireside Poets that I produced in conjunction with the historic Wayside Inn. Erica is lovely, this book is lovely. (Like I said, I LOVE THIS BOOK SO MUCH. Everything about it is LOVELY.)

{PS: I have not dug into this one yet, but check out this book called House by the wonderful Tracy Kidder below. It was a NYT bestseller and chronicles the building of a house in MA and follows the homeowners, the builder, the architect, and everyone else in between. I found out about this one via Amanda Hesser and her fab newsletter, Homeward.}

{PPS: The location of this particular book on this grand wall is a good one to attempt to show the scale/layout. It’s about 16 feet off the ground; that loopy light fixture to the left of it in the left pic below is above a large door/window combo that’s maybe 10 feet tall? The middle photos shows a top-down view to the floor below and yeah, we have a few empty shelves here as we figure out the best ladder situation.}

You can find all my 50th Birthday Book Recommendations HERE.