The Star House Project: Building Toussaint a Home.

"The ache for home lives in all of us, the safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned." Maya Angelou

The ache for a home of my own has been a lifelong pursuit since the beginning of my career as a poet, musician, and as an artist of an ever-challenging cultural terrain. In an economy that systematically continues to skew-from-grasp, the essentially grounding and critical necessity of a secure space from which to live and build my craft has been my most enduring struggle as an artist. Now, at the well-earned age of 60, having plied an extraordinary life-thus-far of art from some of the most limited and exorbitant forms of rental housing here and across the country, I now have the opportunity through this campaign, to complete the build of my own permanent and self-sustaining tiny house, appreciatively known as “The Star House,” a universal sanctuary of stellar inspirations.

As I solely account for my life's welfare and effectively prepare to secure my future housing, it is all the more critically important that I secure the reliance of my own home. Having the permanent security of my own home, plus this creative place of comfort from which to thrive, this will then afford me the tremendous freedom to pursue my writing, music, and art full-time, an opportunity unlike anytime thus far.

With a goal of $20,000, I would like to sufficiently raise enough funding to efficiently acquire needed materials and to hire an experienced carpenter to effectively finish the build of The Star House by April 2020. As a poet, I am indeed not a carpenter. But to the best of my abilities, I will fully be on hand to physically and conceptually assist in this build as needed.

Three Wonderful ways The Star House will critically benefit my future:

1. The provision of a self-designed, self-sustainable permanent home of my own, specifically designed to meet all my housing needs, comfortably set in the community and infinite inspiration of the Vermont woods.

2. The ensuing liberation of my life as an artist, allowing me the opportunity to fully devote my time and attention to an active full time career of writing, music, performance, teaching, healing and creative well-being, as I'll finally be unbound from the impeding instability of renting. The Star House and it's surrounding gardens and grove of apple trees will also provide me the space to hold small performances and workshops.

3. Among the many ways I will wondrously benefit from The Star House, most dearly, this beautiful home of my own will afford me the personal sanctuary of a fertile home from which to blossom spiritually and thoroughly beyond the strictures of modern inequities. 

The Star House Design.

This Star House, perched on an easily accessible beautiful mountain-top property in Woodbury, VT, is built on a solid 8’ x 30’ trailer on wheels, with an interior 20’ great room with windows on each side, and an exterior 10’ front porch, above which is a 10’ sleeping loft, which will also include a small window. This house was recently purchased pre-framed with metal framing throughout. As pictured above, before this house can be occupied, The Star House is structurally in need of exterior and interior completion: siding; roofing; placement of star-shaped-finials along roof-ridge-line; rock-wool insulation throughout the ceiling, walls, and floor; interior walls; electrical wiring; lights; kitchen counter, sink, installation of small 4-burner/with oven propane stove, fridge, and shelving; installation of a Jotul 602 wood stove and stove-piping; the installation of a large rear picture-window, on the back wall; and construction of multi-use storage-stairs to loft. There will be ample shelving throughout the house. The front porch will be built to have a porch door, and low 4' side walls with shelving, and the entire porch screened-in on all 3 sides, with the option of insertable windows for winter use. The Star House will be built to be solar-powered, with an optional hook-up for on-grid electrical use. For optimum maintenance and sustainability, the house will not have traditional plumbing, but will have a below-sink water tank operated by dual foot pumps, supplying water to both the kitchen sink and a small shower. The wet-bath shower room will also have a built-in compost toilet, with a removable bucket. Beyond the finished structure of the house, I will provide and develop my own furnishings.

My dear gratitude for your love and support.

The wealth of community, of like-hearted dear friends, neighbors, artists, co-inhabitants of this adventurous journey we all share, this is the community, however near, far, large or small, that has so profoundly nurtured and joined me all along the way. I so deeply thank you all for all of your mindful support. Get your most stately hats ready for for the most spectacular poet-glamorous house-warming to date! Saturday April 25th, 2020!