Hello and welcome back to the Rural Studio Bathhouse blog!

We have been hard at work moving the project forward. Sorry it has been a while since we spoke, but we are so excited to provide a much-anticipated update on the progress of our project. Last time we provided an update, we were busy preparing for Pig Roast.

The team worked hard and pulled together to produce drawings, a taped-out floorplan, and a dry-stacked mock-up of our outdoor shower for Pig Roast! The day was full of presentations and celebrations of the work done by all teams, as well as music and fun with our families and friends.

A week after Pig Roast, our team made our way to Auburn for a huge milestone in our life—We Graduated! (believe it or not)

After several weeks of celebrations, the team returned to Hale County. To keep the drum beat and momentum going into the summer, we have recently welcomed several visitors back into the fold. 

Kiel Moe and Joe Burns returned to continue helping the team with the structure and better focus the overall design. After discussion with Kiel and Joe, the team has decided to simplify our natural lighting strategy. 

We are doing this by introducing ambient light into the existing breathing wall pods from clerestories in the north and south walls. In doing so, we are taking advantage of the layered system of construction by just removing layers of the walls to introduce natural lighting. In the toilet and shower pods, we will use large skylights to create a more direct connection to the sky and trees above. 

More recently, Dan Wheeler returned to help with detailing and working through the design of the windows and skylights.

Finally, Jake Labarre returned to help us in preparation for our final executive review. He drew through 1:1 details with us and helped us begin to prepare a drawing set in preparation for construction.

We had our final executive review and are very excited to push hard towards construction! The team is working to produce construction drawings for our outdoor shower, which will serve as a test of most of the details in our project. The team will test the foundations and pouring a slab, stacking the walls and threading the rods through the walls, and attaching the roof structure to the walls. In the end, the outdoor shower will provide the team valuable knowledge for the construction of the rest of the project, as well as a testing ground for fixtures and other finishes that may be considered for the whole building. The team plans to be in the ground for the outdoor shower in the next few weeks. 

Thank you so much for reading along and we look forward to providing another exciting update very soon!

-Rural Studio Bathhouse Team

Carla, Ambar, Ashley, and Logan