A true natural builder before “natural building” hit the scene, SunRay Kelley is a legend. His large Tolkien-esque buildings, like living organisms rising up out of the earth, have appeared around the country during the past 30 years. The temple at the popular Harbin Hot Springs resort was built by SunRay.
SunRay Kelley, photo from sunraykelley.com
SunRay comes from a logging family in the Pacific Northwest and calls the woods “God’s Hardware Store” where he goes “shopping” for inspiration.
The hermitage photo from sunraykelley.com
On the smaller scale, he has built at least eight 12′-diameter yurts and is hosting interns from April through June build another one this summer.
Sauna photo from sunraykelley.com
Be sure to check out more photos of this dome.
Many thanks to Lloyd Kahn for sending me his most recent book, Builders of the Pacific Coast, where SunRay is featured along with many other builders. Now I have several hours of browsing these whimsical designs ahead of me.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi there,
Can’t find an email contact for you on your blog–I’m a writer working with a new environmental site (www.onemillionactsofgreen.com) and I’d like to interview you and your husband for a feature story on living small.
Please feel free to contact me at leighbailey@speakeasy.net. Thanks! LOVE your blog!
Leigh
How beautiful! and he is adorable!!! Like a hobbit.
I was pals with Sun Rays lil brother Mike when him and me were going to SVC 35ish years ago. Sun Rays main house is 4+stories of the craziest place you ever saw nestled in the woods of a county in northwest Washington. If I die with a coolness factor of 10% as opposed to Sun Rays 110% I will be a happy man.
Hello Ray,
You may or may not remember me ! My mother Debra has been very close friends with your sister Pola for many years. Anyhow It must be some 35 years since I lived at the end of the road there…..I”m 42 now and raising a teen daughter, I work as a glass artist and have for 18 years now. your work.. early as it was.. and as well as i can remember…. served as lasting inspiration for mine. I think now and then of the wizard in the mantle, and the bronze hands holding the rafters… your soapstone sculptures.. listening to Jessie play his guitar..swimming in cold creek..and the freedom a seven year old boy experienced one summer back in 1976 playing in the woods around the old farm, This is a time and place I will never forget.
Was surprised to recognize your architecture before your name when cruising craigslist earlier today ( beautiful place by the way ) in search of a small farmhouse , I hope to end up back in that area within the next few months.
Jonathan