Open-Air Living in the Mountains of Bali

A former London city slicker, Simon Evans made the move from an urban apartment to this darkened tropical home among the trees. He worked together with local business Bali GreenWorld to design and construct his new home — a two-story 377-square-foot construction made entirely out of locally sourced materials. And he cleared out all the dividing walls on the top narrative to make a whole 360-degree perspective of the surrounding woods. “Words fail me when it comes to describing the extreme all-natural beauty surrounding me, along with the incredible generosity, warmth and kindness of the local people,” states Evans.

at a Glance
Who lives here: Simon Evans
Location: Mount Batukaru, Bali, Indonesia
Size: 115 square meters (377 square feet); 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom
That’s interesting: Each of the building’s renewable materials were gathered within 2 miles of the house.

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A food woods, owned and maintained by members of their local village, encircles the home. The open architecture of the house allows the flow of passersby in the village to stop for a conversation. “I do not be concerned about security at all, as there is always someone from around the area to keep an eye on what is happening,” says Evans. “It is a complete comparison with London, where I locked my windows each night for fear of being broken into.”

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A seat seat created from recycled boat wood faces from the food woods. Bamboo blinds serve as walls on the two stories of the house and can be tied in the end picks up. “When it gets cold or I feel like a little privacy, decreasing the blinds changes the house completely,” Evans says. “When my blinds are available, you are in the middle of it all — the volcano and Mount Batukaru into the north, with a view down the sea into the south.”

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Upstairs, Evans’ office is made up of laptop and also a beanbag overlooking the woods. “Living here is like a fantasy,” he states. “The design of my house actually allows me to experience all nature up close.”

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Evans put his bed on a raised platform at the center of the top floor, providing him a 360-degree woods perspective. Carefully managing the flow of water throughout the home has eradicated most regions where mosquitoes can easily reproduce, so there is no requirement for windows and walls.

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The best story has a lounge area using simple daybeds for relaxing with a book or just enjoying the view.

It is no surprise that this oasis has convinced Evans to stay in Bali. “Though London has a lot to offer, the price of living in a metropolis is too little instant community; it felt very anonymous residing there,” he states. “Having now lived in an incredibly close neighborhood, I’d find it very tough to give up that closeness.”

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Linda Van’t Hoff, a local expat plus a designer at Bali GreenWorld, enjoys a cup of java with Evans on the bottom narrative. Having lived in the area for 20 years, she understood how to design the house to match with the local surroundings. “From the bamboo and rocks which form the framework, through to the tali ijuk — the string used to tie the bamboo — that was made from local palm tree fibers, everything which could be acquired was,” Evans says.

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Local fruit and flowers provide splashes of colour to the minimalist and clutter-free interior. “It’s a gorgeous feeling within Simon’s house,” Van’t Hoff states. “It is a bit like being at a bamboo grove, together with the warm yellow tones of the bamboo dominating the space in a really natural and peaceful way.”

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The roof, made up of 30,000 shingles, has been the most laborious part of the project and took the longest. Each shingle needed to be made cleaned, treated and put individually. The huge number of these handmade bits meant that much of this work needed to be outsourced to surrounding villages.

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“It was a spectacular process to witness,” says Evans of this roof-building process. “The piles of shingles seeming outside each family compound and lining the local roads were a constant reminder of not merely the scale of this project, but also the ease with which the local Balinese men and women work together.”

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Evans had all those locally sourced bamboo handled onsite with ellagic acid. To ensure that bugs stay out of this bamboo, he sometimes smokes the house using a portable fireplace.

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The ground-floor kitchen is open to the elements. Evans often cooks using food he has developed on his own patch of land. ” Every week I am in a position to decrease the amount of food I want to buy, together with well over 50 edible plants already growing organically in my property, and more gardens and food plants being added per week,” he states.

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The home’s only fixed walls encircle the ground-floor bathroom. Bamboo shutters open directly into the backyard. A nearby spring feeds the Bali rock bowl and bamboo tap.

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The house is set about 325 feet from one of the entrances to some secure rainforest. Its presence stops poachers from entering the woods unnoticed and averts off biking and other damaging activities.

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The house’s shape mirrors the shape of Mount Batukaru behind. The home stays on 2,000 square meters (over 21,000 square feet) of property, which used to mostly be a java grove. Now the soil hosts a vast array of fruit trees, vegetables and other useful plants, such as Western salad leaves and herbs.

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