Photographer Documents Northern California's Back-to-the-Land Architecture Movement

Los Angeles-based photographer Michael Schmelling has spent five years documenting the architectural legacy of the 1960s-1970s back-to-the-land movement in Northern California. Working with collaborator David Jacob Kramer, Schmelling traveled through Mendocino and Humboldt Counties, capturing images and collecting oral histories of the pioneers who built unconventional homes in these remote areas. Their project will be published this summer in the book 'Handmade Utopia: Back-to-the-Land Architecture in Northern California.' The movement attracted thousands of young idealists disillusioned with the Vietnam War and industrial capitalism, who purchased inexpensive, clear-cut land with minimal regulation. Inspired by Stewart Brand's 'Whole Earth Catalog' and a do-it-yourself ethos, they constructed cabins, geodesic domes, yurts, and other structures using locally milled wood and salvaged materials. Schmelling's photographs reveal a distinctive 'hippie modernism' aesthetic characterized by rough-hewn pine, stained-glass windows with psychedelic motifs, and structures that blend with the Pacific Northwest landscape. The photographer emphasizes that these settlers were early adopters of solar power, organic farming, and sustainable living practices that influenced modern environmentalism. The project documents individuals like Frannie Leopold, a Berkeley anti-war protester; Laird Sutton, a former San Francisco minister; and Tom Hessler, a former cannabis grower. Schmelling expresses urgency in capturing these stories as the original builders age and their homes become abandoned, gradually being reclaimed by nature. The work originally appeared in Aperture magazine's issue 262, 'The End of Nature?'