One Man’s Trash…

Hidden deep in the woods of Catskill, New York, some 15 miles from Kaaterskill Falls, one of the tallest waterfalls in the eastern United States, lies a quaint little village. Like any good town, it contains a library, a chapel, some houses. There are quirkier attractions, too, helping lend some uniqueness to the place: The Archive of Lost Thought stands not far from a building known as the “Fun Palace,” to name but two. Finished after a long hard day of work? Why not take a load off at the local sauna, or meet up with some friends at the Whiskey Still!

It is, for the most part, a completely normal, totally run-of-the-mill town… 

Except it is built entirely from trash. 

The project, known as b-home, is the brainchild of Matt Bua, an artist and “intuitive builder,” who has been toiling away at the land for nearly 20 years, alongside a ragtag band of fellow creatives. 

It’s far from the first time that an artist has attempted to go off the grid and create work more sustainably. The project itself takes inspiration from Drop City, the infamous artist colony that sprung up in Southern Colorado in the late 1960s, while the recently released documentary Secret Mall Apartment documents eight Rhode Island artists who built and lived in a hidden home in Providence Place Mall’s parking garage for four years as a protest against the developers driving them out of their studios. 

But at two decades of age, and containing nearly five dozen complex structures, b-home is certainly one of the most expansive of these projects. And now, for only $215,000, the entire place could be yours.

A Town of Trash

By 2006, Matt Bua had already spent a dozen years grinding away in New York City, creating work and collaborating with others in the downtown art and music scene. 

“Me and Jesse Bercowetz and Ward Shelley — all these other people,” he tells me over Zoom, in an early April conversation, “were always having a good time collaborating on installations. You build furiously for a couple of weeks, [creating] like, 12 projects a year. Build it up, rip it down.”

Yet, despite the joy he’d find by creating sculptures in unsuspected places (behind a museum, or hidden underneath staircases), there was something missing. In search of relief from the city’s constant hustle, he and his friends would often pile into a car and escape upstate to visit Kaaterskill Falls and find tranquility. 

When a 13-acre plot of land became available nearby, Matt’s mind ignited. “All of a sudden,” he exclaims, “I had an idea for a place where I could build a miniature version of every type of dwelling I could think of.” 

It would be a place of permanence, where he could “put their waste to work” and live in harmony with the natural world — a stark contrast to the city life he was leading.

He purchased the land and immediately dove in. Whenever he could get away from his Brooklyn studio, he’d lug equipment two hours north and toil away on the retreat. His first builds? A composting toilet and a cabin to sleep in, which he specifically kept small to make it easier to heat during the cold winters, and to ensure he’d actually complete the structure.

“A lot of people say they are building their dream home,” he tells me, laughing, “and 10 years later…they’re still building their dream home. They don’t have any more money, and it’s huge!” 

Used to scavenging materials for his sculptural installations, Matt drew inspiration from the refuse that was now readily available to him. Slab wood and discarded first cuts from local mills were plentiful. Urban detritus he’d drag from Brooklyn remained under tarps, in favor of the “beautiful hemlock pine” and “curvy oak and black locust” he suddenly had access to. Slowly but surely, Bua began to do away with “crapsmanship” — the “do it wrong, do it strong” mentality he and his friends had previously embraced — and fell in love with what he could create given new materials and no deadline for opening an installation.

Matt became so deeply involved with b-home that when a neighboring 13 acres came up for sale, he jumped at the chance to expand the scope of his project. Within a few years, he would be spending almost all of his time living and working on the property.

It was never a solitary project, though. Folks he had met throughout his artistic journey were invited to build their own structures and installations, and the village took shape organically, the product of dozens of creative minds working together. At the same time, Matt started creating works off-property for the greater community, including the Catamount People’s Museum, a gathering place and celebration of local history built from wooden scraps and shaped like a giant cat.

When I ask what being in relationship with his neighbors has taught him about sustainability, Matt smiles. “You know,” he says, “I know that word’s been demonized…but I think it just means community, and sharing resources.”

A Millennia-Long Effort

From the earliest days, it was clear there were hidden members of the community involved in the construction of b-home, too: the indigenous peoples who have inhabited the Catskills for thousands of years prior to Matt’s arrival.

“One day, you [might think], ‘Oh, I’d love to have a stone path through here,’” he explains. “And then many years later, you separate the leaves — and there is [already] a stone path.”

The closer he looked, the more he could see their mark. The rock piles that dotted the woods were actually ancient cairns, while small dips in the forest floor were the remains of hand-dug canals. Creating b-home was no longer the process of just building on the land, but also of dusting off what already existed.

Of particular fascination to Matt were the stone walls he kept stumbling upon. “There’s this built stone landscape that you were told, ‘Oh, the farmers did it in less than 100 years. They built 252,000 miles.’” Matt says. But the more he found, he says, the stranger that story sounded.

“Studying history and written records,” he explains, “there happens to be little more than zero written records to support the Europeans built any of the stone walls post-1492.” 

Bua went so far as to write a book about these barriers lining the woods of the Catskills titled Talking Walls, which celebrates its 10-year publication anniversary this year.

But it’s the spiritual connection with those who came before, and lived as one with the natural world, that really excites Matt, as well as the ability to celebrate their creations, rather than destroy them.

“There is this amazing humanized landscape we’re working with here that was carved by the people before us,” Matt says, his voice slightly tinged with awe. “If I didn’t wake up to what was already here, I would have [just seen them as] free rocks.”

A New Beginning

All things must come to an end, though, and the time has come for Matt to pass his creation on to the next person. As his family has grown, the artist has found himself building on the property less and less. It’s become clear that the most sustainable way to use b-home these days is to pass it along. 

While he says “the hope is to find somebody who’s excited to continue and edit, and to build whatever it is they can think of,” he also knows that the next steward will find their own unique relationship with the land. 

It may be a bittersweet feeling, but even still, Matt appreciates what b-home has taught him. “I mean, it’s hard,” he tells me, “But… the process is the point.”

As we begin to wrap up our conversation, he takes a deep breath. “I’m glad [b-home has] hit a vein,” he confides, “and that people are thinking ‘Oh, that’s cool.’ It’s true — there are so many ways to build with the seven tons of waste each modern house makes. But really, it’s about the journey. The process has already been great, and whatever happens… I’m just counting the blessings that it’s given to me.”

Interested in learning more about b-home, or what it would take to become its next “artist-in-residence”? Check out the real estate listing for more information!