What a great conference! Last sunday Christopher and I got back from the USA and with us the good old Jetlag and a little post-travel-blues, just because it’s been so nice. The 20th World Treehouse Conference was our highlight, wrapped in an adventurous roadtrip with a substantial wingspan all the way from Victoria B.C. to Takilma, Oregon. We’ve got a lot of stories to tell, a single blogpost just wouldn’t be enough.

This year the conference took place October 7th-9th, located again at Out’n’About, Michael Garniers Treehouse-Resort in Takilma, Oregon. The conference is not only for treehouse pros, but for all who are interested in trees and their housings or those who even want to build their own treehouse. This time many different nations were represented (USA, Canada, Australia, Japan, Germany, Norway, Netherlands), which I found was very nice. Among the participants were not only Christopher and me, but apart from Rainer the whole Baumbaron-team – Johannes, Vitus and Tim.

Although the conference gains some volume each year, just like a tree, it was manageable and very personal. In three days we had enough time to meet new friends and renew old friendships.

From tree biology to building treehouses on TV the lectures and workshops varied widely. Here’s a short overview:

Michael Garnier and Jake Jacob: expert knowledge from up to 25 years of building treehouses

Scott Baker and Casey Clapp: tree biology

Michael Garnier and Vitus Wahllaender/Christopher Richter: Bracketree, discussion and demonstrations

Ryan/J’Sun/Jake/Dave Stice: Rigging Basics

Philip van Wassenaer: tree biology and pulling tests

Tom Cudleigh and Malte Jacob: Free Spirit Spheres

Pete Nelson: treehouse design

Michael Garnier and Nabil Taha: treehouse construction

Barefoot Murph: building treehouses as a spiritual and revolutionary practice

Michael Garnier, Pete Nelson, Daryl McDonald, Jake Jacob and team: building treehouses on TV

In the course of the next weeks we will dig deeper into some of the topics.

Images by courtesy of ourselves