The Vespiary Book Binding & Book Conservation

If you’ve been following my Twitter feed, you’ll know that I’m in the process of converting my old shed, previously used for pottery, into the new home of The Vespiary workshop.  We gathered all kinds of materials this past week: shingles, flooring, replacement studs, etc.  We’ll hopefully soon be bringing in some locally grown insulation (wool!), and siding.

Yesterday, thanks to the help of a bunch of folks, got most of the old thing excavated. As promised, here are some photos of the process.  I’ve been puzzling over how this 100+ year old structure has been able to stand with no foundation.  The pictures will show the ol’ river stone method. Get stones, put em in a line, build a house on top of it. In fact, I think when I was house hunting on the north side, I almost bought one with the same style foundation.

The hidden gold is the ancient pile o’ tilthy dirt the shed has been sheltering.  I’ve been throwing the whole mess onto my garden and expect tomatoes the size of watermelons this summer.  Any ideas what I should do with the Missoula Lake river rocks I’ve been pulling out of the dirt? Put your thoughts in the comments!