FRG TEAM 2024
Eric Lassotovitch - Co-Founder, Polecraft Solutions
Eric is a licensed building contractor in Northern California. He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from California College Arts and Crafts, Oakland, CA. He innovates efficient pole frame crafting solutions, and draws plans for clients. The appeal of using the small diameter trees that currently need to be thinned from many tracts of forests in Mendocino County has inspired him to use his drawing skills to manifest new tools and techniques for a unique approach to round-pole timber framing. Energy efficiency, affordability, healthy homes, and appropriate usage of local materials are among his top design considerations. Eric is co-founder, with Colin Gilespi, of Polecraft Solutions.
Colin Gillespie - Co-Founder, Polecraft Solutions
Colin has worked in the construction trades for over 20 years. He has had training and experience in eco-forestry, permaculture design, and natural building, as well as degree in sociology. He has built several homes and structures that combine the benefits of modern and ancient building techniques into elegant round-pole timber frames with straw bale infill constructions. He has had extensive experience in clay and lime plasters, sculpted cob, and waxed earthen floors. He has dedicated himself to the creation of highly efficient, healthy homes for living in harmony with nature. Collin is co-founder, with Eric Lassotovitch, of Polcraft Solutions.
Jenny Burnstad - Co-Founder, Cloud Forest Institute; Community Organizer; Bookkeeper
Jenny Burnstad is the Fiscal Director and co-founder, along with daughter Freeda and late husband Patrick, of Cloud Forest Institute. She is a co-founder of MendoDragon Intentional Community in Boonville where a small diameter pole "sun room" is in the process of being built. Jen is active as a volunteer with local community efforts including helping to organize the Not So Simple Living Fair. She has enjoyed vocations as a Rock Shop proprietor, silversmith, basket weaver, chair caner and organic gardener. Jen is a QuickBooks Coach and worked with West Company as a Small Business Development Center, SBDC Bookkeeping Consultant.
John Cunnan - Round Wood Craftsman for 50 years
John has been a wood craftsman since 1972 when he taught woodcraft to the apprentices of Allan Chadwick. He founded the Round Valley Wood Wrights in 1979 and ran the wood shop for the Covelo Garden Project while it was active. John took 4th place in a national competition to create a Peace Garden as a symbol of what America really stands for, living in harmony with all of life.
He enjoys teaching wood work to developing children with the hope of promoting their love of wood and nature.
In his free time he makes natural round wood furniture for my side business, Wildwood Crafts.
Sharon Lloyd - Architect, Artist
Sharon Lloyd has developed her professional skills and talents in the fields of architecture and fine art. She received her degree from the University of California at Berkeley and prior to this was one of the founding members of the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc). During the course of her professional career in architecture she has worked in Los Angeles, San Francisco and the Monterey peninsula area in a variety of roles giving her a broad range of experience in the architectural field. Prior to relocating to Mendocino County her focus was in the field of Organic Architecture primarily at the office of Mickey Muennig in Big Sur. Presently her focus is the “Tiny House” and all that this encompasses. She is now in the process of building a self-sufficient “Tiny House On Wheels”. While pursuing a career in architecture, Sharon concurrently pursued a career in fine art. Her work has been shown in museums, galleries and she has been recognized in various publications, mostly in the Monterey/Carmel areas, where she also received awards.
Bodhi Harnish - Herbalist, Fabricator and Woodsman
Graduate of Hampshire College, Bodhi has traveled the world with an interest in urban planning and architecture as well as environmental and social movements. He is passionate about trees and their fungal communities. Enthralled by soil and all the alternatives to oil. A believer in the human spirit of ingenuity, that when we unite, we can turn every problem into a solution. With a strong sence of place, living ensconced off-the-grid near the headwaters of the Eel River. Bodhi is interested in learning and teaching the aspects that makes a good steward on the land, respective of historical appropriation and place-based ecological knowledge.
Govinda Dalton - Founder, Spirit Resistance Radio; Board Member: Cloud Forest Institute
Govinda has been thinning small diameter trees on his forestland and using the round poles to build lodges and other meaningful structures for over 20 years. The catastrophic fire that tore through Mendocino County in 2008 skirted or moved right through the thinned forestland he’s been tending with little damage to tree stands. Govinda is the Media Technician and founder of Spirit Resistance Radio. He is on the International Indian Treaty Council, is part of the Indigenous Environmental Network, the Western Shoshone Defense League; and has held a key role in forest preservation activism. Govinda is also on the Board of Directors of Cloud Forest Institute.
Matilda Hernandez-Miyares
Matilda Hernandez-Miyares is a human being intent on aligning their sur[thri]vival with their local forest and communities.
Matilda spent the past 7 years living on the edge of the Mendocino National Forest, as a self directed explorer, pursuing many interests coalescing around; being a regenerative human, engaging with natural systems and designing for symbiosis.
These explorations include: offgrid living and homesteading, forest tending, reintroduction of good fire and biochar production, natural building, permaculture design and perennial agriculture, mushrooms, Soil Food Web & using a microscope to access microbial communities.
More Collaborators
Blair Phillips - Founder, Abuela Gardens; Founder, Common Vision
Anna Hope - Activist, Natural Home Builder Advocate
Brenda Quintero - Founder, Golden Rocks Permaculture Farm; Co-founder, Valley Fire Phoenix Rising; Founder, TREES; 501c(3) small business consultant
Dane Downing - District Manager, Covelo Sewer District
Partners
Natural home builders who combine round pole timber framing with strawbale, cob, and other earth based materials that include pumice-crete foundations, earthen-floors and natural plasters.
FRG works together with PCS to bring public attention to their engineer stamped, round pole frame, fire safe home designs as a viable and fire resistant alternative to conventional housing. Through Cloud Forest Institute, FRG has provided Polecraft Solutions with funding for the engineering of an efficient "Saltbox" round pole timber frame that is now available to the public as a kit,
The Eel River Recovery Project
Long time forest health and watershed advocates, with an emphasis on empowering local communities along the Eel River to monitor ecological conditions and work together to formulate and implement restoration strategies.
The Northern Mendocino Ecosystem Recovery Alliance
Based in the Leggett/Laytonville area, their mission is to foster fire resilience and responsible land care by acquiring and administering grants for projects that employ local workers and contractors to do the real work of restoring our forests, grasslands, and economy. With an emphasis on local forest work crew development and educational outreach.
Please help us achieve our goals of incentivizing increased forest restoration and revitalizing local economic opportunities through small pole utilization, the massive byproduct currently going to waste from forest improvement projects throughout California.
Raising a small diameter timber pole frame in Laytonville, Ca