“Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own experience and your own common sense.” – Buddha

This is the guiding principle of Chiangmai Life Construction (CLC) and the adage that the owner, Dr Markus Roselieb, lives by. In trying to understand the man and the company, I wanted to put labels on them (‘doctor’, ‘green company’; ‘sustainable construction’ etc). I have since learned that labels are for cans (Anthony Rapp, actor) and that they can never fully define who any one or what any company is.

Labels come with certain judgments and assumptions that can be limiting. Really we ought to believe nothing unless it agrees with our own common sense (hence the title of this post). But don’t take my word for it.

Chiangmai Life Construction

All right, if I can’t pigeonhole CLC as a green construction company, how then can I describe it?

Markus puts it succinctly: “The company is about construction for enhancing life as opposed to construction for mere survival which is what I see a lot of nowadays: bad materials and bad architecture resulting in spaces that nobody wants to stay longer than necessary in.

“Ask yourself what and why do you build anything? Do you build things to keep life out or do you build things to make life more comfortable, more livable and to increase the quality of life?

What is the function of a building? What should it fulfill? I look at the available space; I try to understand it and I try to understand the people who will be using it. Then I think about the materials that are most appropriate for the function and the space that I have before I can create the design. The outcome should be something you look at, smile and say this is the place I want to be in.”

Talking about the using labels like ‘green’ construction

“I think the most important thing is common sense and not labels. I use my own judgment whereby I don’t rape the earth but build quality. And I use traditional ancient knowledge and the knowledge that is available today because it is nonsense to ignore the increase of knowledge that has occurred during the history of mankind.”

That includes working with concrete that uses up a lot of energy to produce and transport?

“I will definitely use concrete foundations because any kind of natural materials you have to get off the earth so they don’t get wet because no natural material likes to be wet; sometimes some materials don’t like it at all.

Some materials can get a little wet but then they have to dry. If you stick a piece of bamboo into wet earth, during the rainy season where it’s wet for 4 or 5 months without drying, then it will rot. And if you are not willing to use concrete or a stone where you fix the bamboo with a metal rod, then in my opinion, you are not sustainable because your building would rot much faster and you have to build again.

All the work and energy consumed by the building process of the whole house and the disruption that occurs for the family far outweighs the use of concrete or metal to make a house that would last 40, 50 or 100 years.

If using concrete is the appropriate thing to do and if it is wise to put in steel reinforcements, if I know this will prolong the lifespan of the building for another 50 years, then the energy that went into producing this is by far less than the energy I would need to build a new building every 5 to 10 years because I have built the kind of building that crumble. So you have to use common sense, not labels.”

What kind of projects would you choose to do?

“There are so many kinds of different projects out there. I don’t think I am the right guy to build a car production company; it’s just not in my horizon of what I would like to be involved with.

Life is not just about staying home; it’s also about working. Interesting workspaces and of course housing and living are areas I will be focusing on. And any kind of agricultural buildings where you combine whatever you do with nature. This gives me the possibility to choose materials that are in tune with nature because this is my choice.”

Doesn’t that limit you to only certain kinds of jobs?

“I would say it frees me to do the kind of jobs that I like to do.”

Of course Panyaden School in Chiang Mai (Thailand) is testament to the kind of job and choices that Markus makes in constructing a building. Look at the blog photos of the salas and the kindergarten and see the passion and care with which nature’s materials like bamboo, stone and earth are crafted to form functional yet inspiring works of art set in an environment of serene greenery.

Yes, these buildings are enforced with concrete foundations and steel rods where appropriate but no more than is needed. There are also plans for waste water treatment to the point where water can be recycled for use back on the land. Decisions like these are made based on wisdom and knowledge culled from research and from talking to local and foreign experts but in the end, they are made from a place of sound judgment and good sense, not from a need to conform to any labels.

Decide for yourself.

Markus and Ajahn Decha discussing a bamboo truss for the kindergarten roof		Markus surveying the Panyaden School construction site
Bamboo drying at CLC		Parents’ Sala Prototype at CLC