Hardwood floors are part of an established home?s heritage. The look of the wood is what draws a guest in and what adds warmth even on the coldest of days. When you decide to install solid wood flooring in your home or office you are not only going for that old familiar aesthetic, but you are also acknowledging that wood flooring is extremely sensible. There is a treasured stability with hard wood flooring, something that immediately elevates the value of your property. With wood flooring you give a nod to the baroque.

In addition to looking beautiful and lush, wood floors are also unquestionably good for the environment. The flooring is, in a sense, insulation between your home and the elements. This insulation is said to be sixteen times as powerful as steel and four hundred fifteen times more productive than steel. Most solid wood flooring is made in America and therefore must adhere to the nation?s strict environmental codes and ordinances.

What grain of wood you select will determine the overall character of your floor. Nothing exudes dependability like oak solid wood flooring. Within each plank you see the life of the tree: the knots and burrs. Another benefit to choosing solid oak flooring is that it does not scratch easily. With proper care, the warmth of the color will last a very long time.

Engineered oak wood flooring is a less expensive option. You get the same look and character, but the installation is much easier. In most cases nails or screws are not necessary, all that you need is a foam underlay. Since most of the engineered oak wood flooring is made in China some may argue that the quality is lower.

While some of the heartiness of solid oak wood flooring may be lost, and the value of your home or business may not increase as much, the appearance is not sacrificed and most people rarely can detect the difference. The greatest difference is in the cost and the installation. A professional with elaborate and specialized tools must install solid oak wood flooring.

A benefit for choosing engineered oak wood flooring is that you have the option of putting in the floor yourself. With the do it yourself craze at full tilt many new and established homeowners are getting excited about improvement projects that can be accomplished within a weekend.

Most major chain home improvement centers not only offer a large variety of engineered oak wood flooring, but they are now offering workshops that will guide you through the step by step process. An added bonus to doing it yourself is that now under floor heating is becoming mainstream. In the same workshop where you learn about wood flooring you can learn about the under floor heat process and how energy efficient a row of heating coils can be.

Choosing to upgrade your home or business flooring is simple, and in most cases, affordable. Going with solid oak flooring or engineered oak wood flooring is up to your taste and your wallet.

Natalie Aranda writes on home improvement. Hardwood floors are part of an established home?s heritage. The look of the wood is what draws a guest in and what adds warmth even on the coldest of days. When you decide to install solid wood flooring in your home or office you are not only going for that old familiar aesthetic, but you are also acknowledging that wood flooring is extremely sensible. What grain of wood you select will determine the overall character of your floor. Nothing exudes dependability like oak solid wood flooring.

I left off in the previous post with a few boards to flatten and smooth with handplanes. I typically use a planing board with a plane stop at the end to perform this type of work. The boards are relatively small and are easily held against the plane stop. This allows me to quickly flip the board around to plane either side without needing to clamp the board again. If I were planing a larger panel I would most likely fasten it between bench dogs.

The handplaning of these particular boards is straightforward along their length with little diagonal planing... so it works out well. Handplaning these boards which will comprise the panels for the drawer cases begins with a long fore or jointer plane to flatten the faces of the boards and ensure they are flat and parallel to each other. I also have the final thickness of each board in mind and work towards this. After the individual boards were resawn a little cupping was introduced , inherent to resawing, and although acclimatization to the studio environment helps to relieve this cup and any other tension in the boards, some minimal cupping remains in each of these boards.

I use a jointer plane in this case, I have it tuned and ready most of the time for work like this. A shorter fore plane would also be ideal since the boards are relatively short in length. Once the boards faces are flat with parallel faces I then move on to a finely tuned smoother plane to ensure the faces of the boards are flat as can be. The term which is used for this type of board preparation is four-squaring the board which ensures that both faces and the two long edges are parallel to each other, and the ends and edges are perpendicular. After completing this process on each of the other boards which will comprise the drawer case panels, I will be squaring the ends to achieve both the correct length of each board and to ensure the boards are perfectly square.

Now that I've completed a couple of projects with redwood, I thought I'd share what I've learned.

• Power tools don't work
  Especially if you choose redwood with any figure, planers and jointers will introduce chipping and tearout. Redwood is a brittle softwood, and does not respond well to high speed tools. Instead of a planer, use a hand plane. Instead of a jointer, use a table saw with a sharp blade.
  
• Sanding Challenges
  Redwood grain lines are much harder and denser than the wood in between. If you sand with a typical finish sander with a padded base, you will find the wood between the grain lines to sand down much more quickly than the grain lines themselves. After discovering this while making my floating shelves I had a decision to make. Do I want to try to get the shelves perfectly smooth or work with the grain. A test board smoothed out nicely with sandpaper attached to a shop made wooden sanding block. But I rather liked the slight raised pattern caused by the softer wood sanding down between the grain lines. So I ran with it.
• Flat? Whassat?
  I found that even BORG "S4S" (Surfaced Four Sides) redwood wasn't perfectly flat and straight. I chose my boards for figure and color first, then by what was flattest. Using a straight line ripping method (use Google, or wait for my write up sometime in the future on this technique) will get you one jointed edge. From there you'll have to decide whether to risk the tearout in a planer or use hand tools. I went the hand tool route...
• Color
  Redwood color can vary widely from a deep maroon to a light tan. While all heartwood will darken with age or exposure to sunlight, the pale sapwood will not. If you leave sapwood in your workpiece be mindful of the fact that it will stay pretty much the same color while the red heartwood darkens over time. Also, there are wide variations in the color of the heartwood. The wood at your store is usually adequately aged so you have a good idea of the color the wood is capable of and where it will end up after aging. Working the wood removes the darker aged color, and it can then be difficult to determine what the color will be. Choose your wood by color, and if you are purchasing different shades of heartwood at the same time, save working the wood until right before your project, and somehow mark the wood after it's been worked to keep the colors separate.
• Finishing
  I'll finish with finishing. I use shellac on redwood whenever possible. Shellac provides a better "lensing" of the highlights in redwood than poly. Many coats, sanding with 400 grit paper after every second coat, gives the best finish. On the floating shelves I had planned to use polyurethane because of the wet environment of a bathroom. But after seeing the results from the small shelf, making a test piece with the poly, and comparing them, I found the shellac to be MUCH nicer. Six coats, a couple coats of paste wax, and the shelves were ready.
  

I hope this helps you to explore redwood. The warm colors, distinctive grain, and specular highlights under shellac, all combine to provide you with a beautiful material for your next project.

Though it does show a little of the environment I grew up in - these were the first thing I thought they were singing about the first time I heard that song...

No, I'm talking about the real thing, which are used for making yarn from raw materials such as wool or cotton:

This one is an antique, made sometime in the later half of the 1800's, and was built by the brother of this man - my great great grandfather:

Jon Vium (my great great grandfather) was well known for his handmade spinning wheels, and he made dozens - if not hundreds - of them that he sold to neighbors and at market.  He was an avid turner, and used a treadle lathe.  He lost his leg when using an adze to flatten some birch - he missed and hit his foot.  This was far out in the sticks, so doctors were several days away at least.  A member of the family was sent to retrieve the nearest doctor, but by the time he was able to get there gangrene had set in.  The amputation took place on the kitchen table, and the sterilizing agent and anesthetic used was whiskey...  There's more, but suffice to say not many can say they have it so tough today.

Even after losing his leg, he continued turning - with the treadle lathe - until his death.  I used the above picture of a whell his brother made because while there may be some of his spinning wheels remaining, I don't know where they are...  There was one that had sat outside for many years, and though it was heavily weathered and missing pieces, dad was able to create a reproduction of the wheels that granddad made using it as a reference along with the wheel pictured above - here's  his version, made in maple:

 

Dad was very proud of his recreated spinning wheel.  It's as close a copy as he could come up with given what he had to start with.  Here's a different view:

Spinning wheels are literally spin fibers such as wool (and other materials) into yarn for use in knitting.  I don't think I can remember my grandmother when she wasn't halfway through another knitted quilt - she was prolific.  She made hundreds of them... I still have several myself that she hand knitted - but she usually bought her yarn at the store in the later half of her life... though I remember telling her showing my mother how she would use the spinning wheel when she was younger - it was on a wheel much like these.

 Fibers first need to be "carded", where a pair of "carders (wooden handled planks with a series of metal combs are used to literally comb the fibers straight - here's grandmother's pair, with a "rolag" of wool started next to it:

 

I won't go too much into the process of spinning yarn, but if you are interested there are other sites more with more experienced information than my own...  including http://www.joyofhandspinning.com/ and some videos on YouTube.   Basically, the fiber is combed straight and rolled up into a "rolag" like above, then one end is mounted in the wheel.  Once you start spinning the wheel, it pulls on the fibers as you feed it, and it twists them at the same time, like a rope at the same time spooling them onto a bobbin.   Twisting makes the thread stronger by intertwining the individual fibers into one continuous thread that you can't pull apart without a good amount of effort. 

My uncle was so impressed, that he took dad's wheel and made his own version - his in walnut: 

These are built as closely as we know to the originals great granddad made, and both of them work - as they have been used.  But - not much, I think... just enough to prove they work.   Most people these days don't knit, much less spin their own yarn anymore - but as with anything, there are still a few out there who are continuing the craft.

Most of the parts for each are turned on the lathe...  These wheels were made using a jig and a router, though originally it would also have been turned on the lathe using a face plate and jig.  The string you see around the wheel is the drive belt...  it rides in one of a series of grooves directly above the wheel - each sized differently so different speeds can be used.  The higher the speed, the more twists per inch are produced on the yarn.

 This particular style of wheel is known as a "castle" wheel, which was popular for those who want to travel with the wheel, or have just a small amount of room for it - the latter of which would have been the case for most of my ancestors.  The houses were not large, so if something could be made to take up less space, the better.

These wheels are an exersize in functionality and design - they are beautifully designed wooden machines that are truly an art form.  I've always been drawn to them, as they are the most aproachable tool - they look like some sort of fancy furniture, but were one of the basics of life not so many years ago, when people used them to make their own fabrics, sheets, blankets, and clothing.  There wasn't a Walmart on the corner, and if there was they couldn't have afforded it anyway.  Their only choice was to literelly make their own - well, everything, almost...  One simply has to respect that sort of independence.   There are modern makers who have updated the design to work better and use modern technology (ball bearings!) - but most of the modern incarnations seem soulless to me, lacking that part of them that I see as art.

When I was younger, I always wondered how such a cool song could have been about a spinning wheel...

Blood Sweat, and Tears - Spinning Wheel

What goes up must come down spinning wheel got to go round Talking about your troubles it's a crying sin Ride a painted pony Let the spinning wheel spin You got no money, and you, you got no home Spinning wheel all alone Talking about your troubles and you, you never learn Ride a painted pony let the spinning wheel turn Did you find a directing sign on the straight and narrow highway? Would you mind a reflecting sign Just let it shine within your mind And show you the colors that are real Someone is waiting just for you spinning wheel is spinning true Drop all your troubles, by the river side Catch a painted pony On the spinning wheel ride Someone is waiting just for you spinning wheel is spinning true Drop all your troubles, by the river side Ride a painted pony Let the spinning wheel fly

 

Of course - when I read the lyrics, I realize that the song is really about a homeless guy in a Mustang...

 

Part VI

With the foundation finally out of the way, it was time for my part to start - framing. I find framing fun, so long as it's not my regular job... and I have done it in the past, so I wasn't too nervous about doing it, except for one thing - the wall framing would be full of angles and small complications that would challenge my abilities... but then again, I like a challenge.

I started by putting together a list of materials I would need, and set out to visit suppliers to get some prices. I'm fortunate to have a large number of building supply outlets all within a close distance to where I live... I didn't get to a fraction of them and I visited two borg stores, a lumberyard associated with a nation-wide chain, 1 local franchise lumberyard (several different locations, but all of them are located within a 100 mile or so radius), and two locally owned lumberyards to get prices. The borg prices were not all that far out of line - but those places simply aren't set up well for putting together large loads and they were the furthest from my house, not to mention the service was basically non-existent from these two places in my experience, so I ruled them out almost immediately.

One of the two locally owned lumberyards' clerks told me that "their estimator is out on a job today - but I'll take your list and he'll get back to you first thing tomorrow"... I never heard from them again. Honestly - if they can't call me back on a larger purchase like this they either don't want or deserve my business. I did notice these guys were out of business/were bought out about a year later - I wonder why?

The national chain store lumberyard's prices were relatively high for my tastes. A friend who was also pricing out a shop told me they were by far the cheapest he had found - but he was buying a packaged garage design, vs. my "custom" order, so that may have had something to do with it.

That left two yards to visit, and these two yards became the final 'competitors' for my business - the local franchise and the other local lumberyard. The cheapest cost I found was at the local franchise store (who also happened to have the closest store), with two caveats - their lumber was of lower quality and their service wasn't all that stellar (not bad - just not stellar). The local yard was more expensive, but the quality of their material was much better... But something else happened while I was at the local yard that convinced me to go with them...

While getting a list of prices from one of the clerks, he asked the fellow behind him what the current price was on OSB, who looked at my list to see how much I was looking for. He said something like "well, for this much I think we could do $6.75" (which was 25 cents more than the other's price). He then looked over and started asking me about what I was building, and we struck up a conversation. Turns out he was the owner of the yard, and we both came from similar backgrounds... In the end, he won my business the old fashioned way. It did cost me a few hundred dollars more to do business with him, but I can say now that the price was well worth it - his little lumberyard gave me by far the best service of any I had dealt with up to then - or have since.

From there, i took my material list and divided that list up into the order needed, starting with the wall framing and roof framing, the roofing, and the trim, siding and interior work. This would allow me to pick up materials and not have to have them sit outside or be in the way while I was working on the building... Here's the very list I used:

I had decided to use 2x6 studs @ 16" O.C. (On Center) for a couple of reasons - first, for the insulation value. In the large scheme of things, they don't cost all that much more money over using 2x4's. Second, one of the main tenets of the gathering darkness that is the future is the cost of energy. It may or may not happen, but to me it's better to be over-insulated rather than under. Energy costs can become crippling - though they are "relatively" inexpensive now, that may not always be the case.

This is also the biggest reason I don't have a large amount of windows - though I may regret this decision the most of all Natural daylight is a huge bonus, but it does come at a price. There's not just the initial cost of the glazing, there's the added cost for heating to consider. I did end up bumping up the size of the windows to the next size, which I think was a good decision.

Another reason is so it holds what's nailed to it without "waves". Structurally, 2x4 studs at 24" o.c. are fine, and will easily hold up the building. You could probably get away with even less... But then any siding you nail to it, or drywall, or even plywood - will not be held straight and become wavy over time. It might not be right away - but it will happen.

Anyway, I now had the material, and it was time to start building. The very first walls I needed to build were the most complicated - the north and south ends, both having a gable; and since I was using rafters and not trusses for the roof, it meant the studs would have to be framed old-style.

I used to know how to use the a framing square, and all the functions that go with it like rafters and the like. But it's been too long, and not having used that knowledge it's long slipped from my grasp. Fortunately, I am an architect - and have access to computer drafting programs that allow me to size each stud *exactly* and help me layout their location on the top plate even though they are angled - here's the framing plan for the north wall:

You can easily see the benefit of knowing how to use a cad program here. I was able to size each individual member and provide for space for the lookouts all before lifting a nail. I printed out a copy of the above and framed up the main part of the wall (not including the lean-to part) exactly as shown on the floor of the shop, and did the same for the south end (which I will show further down). Then, it was time for an old fashioned "barn-raising" - I gathered a few friends and relatives to help me put the walls up:

Most of the time, you would build the wall so you could tip it up right where it wanted to live - but I could only get these guys together for the one day, so I built both the north and south walls to have them ready... There wasn't enough room on the slab to build them in place, so after we got the wall up we had to shimmy it down to it's final resting place and lift it up over the anchor bolts. I don't mind telling you - these walls were HEAVY! The more help the better.

A sill seal goes down first to fill small gaps between the bottom plate and the concrete foundation wall. The bottom plate is treated wood by code - this is done as it's the most likely location for water to puddle and over time rot the wood.

Once in place, the wall were roughly plumbed and then braced with 2x's tied to stakes driven in the ground or using a pair of 2x's to form a triangle on the inside. These were the only two sections of the wall I planned on tipping up like this - the rest would be built in place by myself.

Next up was the south wall:

The studs were all sized in that drawing, and I created a second drawing to help me lay out their location on the top plate:

Then it was on to putting up that wall:

After it was in place it was also roughly plumbed and bolted down to the anchor bolts in the foundation:

Once the walls were up and the help was gone, I went through and plumbed the two walls. To do this, I parked one vehicle on each side of the wall and tied a rope on each side of the wall, in a loop around the top of the stud and plate where the existing brace we had put up was located down to the bumper of the vehicle. I left a little slack in each line and using a stick, tightened the line like the cord on a bow-saw... Once the slack was all taken up, I removed the nails holding the brace and re-plumbed the wall, tightening the side it needed to go to by twisting the rope on that side more until the wall read plumb., then nailed the brace back into place. You can apply a great deal of pressure using this method, and I was able to plumb the walls around the entire building using this method.

Then it was on to the east wall (the top in the graphic below), which I framed in-place:

The headers over the windows and overhead door are triple 2x10 with a 1/2" plywood core, a diagram of which I will show in a minute... The .

This tied the north and south walls together on the east side, but I then figured should tie the west end of these sections together at the spot where the "main" roof butts into the "lean-to" portion of the roof - the spot labeled #7 in the graphic below:

 

This is to be the main beam for the roof at that spot, so it needed to be a pretty substantial - and straight - beam. I started by first setting up the two 6x6 columns at their planned locations that the beam would rest on (asking a beam to span 32'-0" is a bit much for traditional construction), as to split the span into thirds. A "U" shaped Simpson column base is bolted into the concrete and fastened to the column with nails and plumbed by forming a triangle with a pair of 2x4's nailed to the column to hold them in place - you can see them in the photo below (with the beam already in place):

The columns at each end are simply nailed together 2x6's that rest within the confines of the stud wall.

It was then time to construct the beam. The beam is made up in layers - first a 2x10, then a layer of 1/2" CDX plywood, then another 2x10, a second layer of CDX, and finally a third 2x10. It works out well with the layers of plywood, as then it ends up the same width as the 6x6 column it rests on:

It's great to have an air nailer for jobs like this - it would wear you out quickly nailing all of this by hand, there are a LOT of nails. Fortunately, I still had my old framing nailer from back in the day.

There was no way I was going to be able to construct the beam on the ground and lift it into place on my own, so I constructed it in place by placing the first 2x10 in place (crowned so the higher point is pointing up), holding it by nailing scraps of plywood to Then it was the next 2x10, and so on until the beam was complete:

A composite beam like this is stronger than a solid beam... the layers help guard against natural defects in the wood, and provide a more homogenous beam across it's length. It's still a bit of a stretch - and by code, these beams aren't heavy duty enough to span the entire distance - so I will add in some knee braces later in the construction process. For now, they will be enough.

To level the beam I used the old bucket of water with a clear hose trick, the same sort of one one documented here on the Taunton web site. I had tried a line level, which is what I used to determine the length of the columns, but ended up having cut the columns about 3/8" too short... Using the water level eliminates such inaccuracies - but I hadn't remembered the trick until after I had cut them. They can be a little difficult to use when you are by yourself and trying to measure a column that has nothing holding it up yet anyway, I guess... Anyway, the short columns were an easy fix with a "shim" of 3/8" plywood.

From here it was a matter of finishing up the rest of the walls and installing the sheathing, which ended up being 7/16" OSB:

There are some that don't like this product, and will only use plywood... Truth is, this material will work just fine for sheathing and is more environmentally friendly than plywood is. And - here's the real issue - it was cheaper.

For bracing, the sheathing on the four corners of the building were specially nailed to create what known as a "braced wall panel". This is done to stiffen the structure against it's natural tendency to lean. The special nailing basically means using ringshank nails 6" o.c. around the perimeter and down each stud line. Another good reason to have a nailer handy - that's a lot of nails.

One thing to remember here, which I nearly forgot:

You can't get into these corners after you've nailed the sheathing on - and if you don't, the corner will always feel cold in the winter and it will be a spot where heat can escape the envelope. Taking your time to insulate the building properly can make a HUGE difference in your heating bill, so if you are building a shop I would suggest you do this - even if you are not planning on insulating it. Someone may want to someday - and it's not much money to do now, but will cost you plenty later should you decide to heat the building.

That's probably enough for this installment. Up next - the roof!

Part IV 

All right then! Here it was, around the beginning of April, and I had a plan for the new shop (more or less) in hand. It was time to go ahead with the construction... or so I had thought, anyway.

I got a contractor lined up to do the concrete. I had decided that work was simply too much for me to handle on my own, and that it would probably serve me better to have it done by somebody else. I didn't have the equipment, nor did I have the help (or the back) to put down the concrete by myself. I might have mentioned that North Idaho was undergoing an unprecedented building boom at the time. What that meant for me was a wait for the permit. Permits usually take just a couple weeks. Usually, this might not be an issue, but the concrete guy I had lined up had a very tight schedule. Well, it turned out I had a couple of issues that permitting wouldn't allow, mainly the bathroom I had discussed previously. With that, I took the plan home and removed it entirely from the design (which actually helped me out budget-wise), but as it would have it I couldn't take the time off of work to get back to the permit office for two week. When I did finally, it was two more weeks before I got the plan reviewed and approved. I called the concrete guy up, and turns out I was past his window of availability. I would have to find another.

That delay led to a two week long search for another concrete contractor. The only one I could find available was still three weeks out before he could start, but he didn't do excavating - though he knew someone who did. So, I contacted him, and he was three weeks out too. So - what I thought might be a two to three week period of getting the permit reviewed and groundbreaking turned out to be entirely too optimistic. By the time I got the excavator there it was the end of May, a full 5 weeks later than I'd hoped.

Being an architect, I'm familiar with the whole process so didn't let it get me down, and just chalking it up to the way things work. But - when this showed up out front of the house early one morning, I started getting a little excited:

It's not really the machine I would have chosen for the task, but as long as the hole got dug, I wasn't going to worry. I had considered doing it myself... had I done it; I would have rented a loader with a backhoe mounted on the back. A track-hoe (like above) tends to rip up the lawn too much when you turn on it... It's also a very small bucket - which can be a good thing, both for digging utility trenches and when you have a plan with a lot of little corners... But I don't have a great deal of experience in digging foundations, and what little I had done was over 20 years ago... I figured it best to leave it to someone who knew more. Besides, the cost of renting a backhoe for myself would have been 2/3rds of the price of paying someone else to do it, so I figured it was better hired out.

It was finally time to break ground. Here's where the shop was to go shown in the site plan again:

Here is a photo of the yard, talen looking north from the end of the patio:

The scarring you see in the center of the yard was from an old willow tree that had to come down a few years prior when a windstorm had knocked the main portion of it's trunk down. The scarring was from the year previously when I finally got the stump out of the ground using a skid-steer I had rented when putting in the pavers for the patio, which you can see in the lower left. Within an hour or two, the trench for the main footings were dug:

Finally, something was happening. I was still worried about the excavation, though - I thought it odd that he would only dig the trench and not strip the topsoil within the footprint of the building first. In the end, it turned out I didn't need to worry about it. The fellow was a young guy, for whom renting himself and his track-hoe out was his main method of income in the warmer months. While young, in the end it turned out he was hard working, honest, and truly concerned with doing a good job - and for not really all that much money, either. But I didn't know that yet at this point, so was concerned. Even though it was taken care of later and I was satisfied with his work, I do wish it had been done properly. But with the building environment the way it was, I was just happy to have somebody to do the job.

Up next, the foundation!

Kudus is a city in the Central Java, Indonesia, located among Jepara, Demak, Pati, and Purwodadi districts and in the route of Semarang the capital city of Central Java to Surabaya (please see location map). Based on story, Kudus name was from Al-Quds, which mean holy.

The history of Kudus cannot be separate from the name of Sunan Kudus as the founder and one of the Wali sanga (nine Wali) spreader of Islam in Java at that moment. As his inheritance, Kudus has a famous artefact called Menara of Kudus which form like a temple, placed in one complex with mosque of Menara Kudus that build by Sunan Kudus around 1685 M.

Except famous as a Wali city, since in Kudus area there is wellknown also Sunan Muria, Kudus also known for a long time as a kretek city (city of clove cigarette) as there are many entrepreneurs in the cigarette field. Beside that, Kudus can also called as city of industry because of the long development of industry in the area such as industries in cigarettes, papers, printings, handycrafts, embroideries, foods, etc.

Kali Gelis (Gelis river) which lying in the midlle of the city separates Kudus into two areas, one is Kudus Kulon (west Kudus), the other is Kudus Wetan (east Kudus). Long time ago, according to history, citizen of Kudus Kulon area were entrepreneurs, traders, farmers and moslem theologians, while occupant of the Kudus Wetan area were government officers, intellectuals, teachers, nobles and noble relatives.

Within the growth and development of Kudus, physically Kudus Kulon area, where the majority of the citizens were entrepreneurs and traders, were a steph forward in wealthy compare with the other area Kudus Wetan. With their financial increasing, they build the traditional wooden houses of Kudus full with carved that make it different with the previous traditional houses. That is why, the amazing traditional house, which lately called as the traditional house of Kudus used to only placed in the Kudus Kulon area. At the beginning, the traditional house of Kudus only belong to the Islamic Chinese traders, but furthermore were copied and developed by the native wealthy traders.

The traditional house of Kudus that mostly build before year 1810 M, ever reach the glorious time and become a symbol of prosperity for the owners. The Kudus Kulon area environment was formed with the particular existency of the traditional house of Kudus.

The developing history of Kudus has many influences from foreign cultures like Hindu, Chinese, Persia (Islam) and Europe, which also influence the architectural field in made the traditional house in Kudus. From the research, it can be concluded that there are several motifs colouring the carving style of the traditional house. One is Chinese motif, which form as the dragon carved, Persia or Islam motif that form as jasmine flowers or the particular motif of Kudus that form as lotus flower and colonial motif that form as ropes, crown, and animals. All motifs have correlation with the incoming cultures to Kudus.

The carving art of Kudus dominate by lotus flower as the meaning of Hindu religion. Sunan Kudus introduced a carving dominated by jasmine flowers that described united one to another. The meaning of jasmine was to describe that Islam religion at that time was a small community but it like jasmine, even small, could give fragrance to the sorrounding area. Jasmine made united in one to another to describe that everybody in neighborhood were live in peace even there were differences in the religion.

Within development in making the traditional house of Kudus, influence of the elements of cultures were very viscous gave the meaning of form and function of every part, hence could be separate as follows:

1. Traditional house as the tools to spread religion (dakwah) *)

In the daily life, Kudus citizen are majority obedient muslem. Life of religious service is the social relations that have formed in the many aspects, such as in the house to live which full with the describing of the rukun Islam (Islamic obligation).

In the room inside, there is a place or room called gedongan which formed as mihrab, a place where imam (leader of praying) lead the pray that connected with the symbolic meaning as a holy place and sacral. Gedongan also has significance meaning used as the place of heirloom treasury and the wealth of the owners. Gedongan used also as the main honorables bedroom and at the particular time used as special bedroom for the wedding couple of the childrens of the owners.

Also in the room inside there are four main pillars, which called saka guru that desribe four essence of ideal life. At the top of the fourth pillars, putted tumpang sari where the roof was lying on. The sum of tumpang sari are always odd and always have a meaning, sum of five describe the amount of praying five times a day. The sum of three describe life in soul world, transitory (this world) and the world hereafter.

Front room that called Jaga Satru is provided for parish and separates into two part, left side for women jamaah (followers of imam) and right side for men jamaah (followers). Still in the Jaga Satru room at the incoming front door, there is one wood pillar in the midlle of the room which called balance pillar or soko geder, which has meaning except as the symbol of ownership of the house, it also has a symbol for reminding the resident about the One God, the only One who have to be homaged.

House as the tools to spread religion is represent through Islamic value that formed in the carved style at the partition between front room and inside room called gebyok. The strengthen element of gebyok are two stalk pillars where at its top made a carved that formed as palm of the hand of muslem when doing praying at the position of takbiratulihram (when start to pray) that always at the same time say the words Allahu Akbar which mean Allah The Mighty.

Carving in the gebyok, even it is accumulation from many culture influences, but the visualitation adopted from Arabic calligraphy with Al Quran and Hadist theme. There are many other dakwah messages that formed in the building decoration and it always about aspects of way of life and life attitude of human in do their obligation in the earth for their salvage in heaven.

2. Traditional house as a masterpiece art*)

Traditional house of Kudus if notice deeply is more and more fabulous since its uniqueness and attractiveness in exterior and interior which full with ornamen that made by highest skill woodcarving artist. Foundation of the existancy of the traditional house of Kudus was full with taste and creation that fashioned in the beautiful forms without broken any religion values. Through the activity of art, there is possibility of adding the atmosphere of the deepest metaphysic reality.

Traditional house of Kudus, if seen from Bernard Rudofsky theory, is include in the communal architect that priorities in the art element which done continuosly and spontaneously balanced by whole community with the same tradition from time to time following the ritual habit inside the communal. Art is not just copy and physical implementation of the external form, it also as the spiritual elements that achieve esthetic form. The creation becomes what it called architectural without architect.

The construction of the wooden house made completely knock down that make it easir to release and assemble hence there is possibility also to make part by part of the ornamen fully detail and accurate. The decoration was inspired by the success of temple relief and the development process was instructed by Chinese woodcarver from Sun Ging area. The owners were the wealthy entrepreneurs and traders. The carved decoration were build on the whole component intentionally without gave any empty space left and the results was very optimum, full of meaning, symbolic and the style were correlation among Java, Gujarat, Persia, China and colonial (Europe) style.

Wali Songo influence in the formed of decoration was very dominant even in Islam religion there is a forbidden in the formed of living thing, but they gave the chance of a huge tolerate formed as acculturation and assimilation on the evolutif way thus create a wonderful figurative consequence of imagination from the living thing forms. Art appreciation from the Wali Songo that full with tolerate also accomplished by khalifah in the Arab since Abbasiyah era. Palace of Harun Al Rasyid in Baghdad, palace of Al Mutasin in Samara, Cordoba mosque in Spain, also decorated by fresco formed lion, eagle, horses, and the other creatures. Drawing arts applicated in carpets, ceramics, wall and doors achieved the highest level to become the world admire.

Art ornamentation looks unite with the main building, since the creators were very concern with details, function, structure, ritual, symbol and esthetic that decoratively increase the attractiveness for whoever want to see it. The particular local habitual in the way of life through the architectural behaviour is the description of personification of the Kudus traditional house that make it different in form and style with the other joglo building in Java commonly, except in the form of the roof and soko guru as the support of the tumpang sari.

3. Traditional house as the Class symbol *)

The beautiful traditional houses of Kudus have average age for more than 100 (hundred) through 200 (two hundred). Due to the age of the building, if someone wants to analyze it, they have to use the examination within that era.

According to Prof. Berger, the structure of the Java community at the 19th and 20th century can be divided into several class such as; nobles, government officers, traders and farmers. Colonial politics at that time placed politic emancipation that have aim to liberate individual from old social band which consider shackles the freedom and law enforcement that hold mostly in the feodalism band. Development of individual in the community was appointed to the forming of personality, spirit effort in order to developing the prosperity soon.

In the other words, Kudus citizen that categories as pesisiran (near the beaches) citizen, their wealthy level mostly higher compare with the nobles and the officers at that moment. But in the daily life they did not get any self-respect and honor by the community. They way of living as a trader was qualified as second class and dishonor, hence as the compensation citizen of Kudus Kulon, that the majority were traders, formed the appearance of their house very glorious with the expectation that their too have the rights to get honor same with the nobles. The level of their house made in high five stairs to suit with the social strata like what it done by noble community. Guess from the farmers were accepted in the front room, for the officers community accept in the midlle room while for Bupati (distric chief) and Netherlands people were accepted in gedongan room. Surrounding the house was made high wall same as the form of palace.

Traditional houses that at the beginning owned by traders of Chinese moslem were copied and developed with the Javanese and Islamic values. All over the house were full of carved with ornament from many styles like in the palace of kings in Java, done by high skilled woodcarvers with very fascinating result. Accordingly, it worth to gets the confession of honor like government officers and nobles. For them, house were a symbol of status or stage that worth to get honor and equality.

(Source :* J Pamudji Suptandar, Great Lecture of Rupa art and Design Faculty of Trisakti University/Adopted in English by Deva's father)

The fascinating wooden carved at the traditional house of Kudus must be come from the very skilled woodcarvers. Then, from where the woodcarvers came from?

The carving style of the wooden traditional house of Kudus was quite distinct from the other famous carving centre in Java, Jepara. Historically, Kudus was a carving centre long before it developed as a skill in Jepara. Carving was introduced to Kudus when an emigrant from the famous carving city of Yunan - China, The Ling Sing, arrived in the 15th century. He came to Kudus not only to spread Islamic teachings but also to devote his skills to the art of woodcarving, and his style, Sung Ging, was famous for its smooth and wonderful woodcarving masterpieces.

The Ling Sing was wellknown as mubaligh (spreader of Islam) called Kiai telingsing. The name of Kiai Telingsing until now use as a name of a street in Kudus city. There is a kampong or village surrounding the street called Sunggingan that predicted came from the Sun Ging name. The area, at the past, was belief as the resident of the woodcarvers and carpenters from the devotion of Kiai Telingsing skills.

From the 16th to the 18th century, woodcarvers in Kudus received many orders to construct wooden houses. The main material - highest quality teak - was supplied from Blora's, Tuban's and Bojonegoro's forest. From the 19th century, however, high quality teak became scarcer and scarcer and this, in turn, discouraged the woodcarvers of Kudus to develop their skills.

The carving skills also belong to Jepara's people and has been very famous until now. There is an opinion, which said that wooden carved art in Kudus also done by woodcarvers from Jepara, eventhough in the reality it different in the carving models, especially in the mission and filosophy.

According the history, Mantingan mosque in Jepara has wall that made from carved white stone with the flower motifs that was masterwork of a Chinese called Tji Wie Gwan who brought by Raden toyib to Jepara after come back from his Islamic study in Campa for five years. Raden Toyib then married with Ratu (queen) Kalinyamat, the very famous Jepara's queen at that time.

For his achievement in build Mantingan mosque at the year of 1559, Queen Kalinyamat and her husband gave a new name for Tji Wie Gwan to become Sungging Badar Duwung, Sungging means carving expert, Badar same with stone and Duwung means tatah (tool for carv).

This Sungging Badar Duwung who then recognized as the root source of the Jepara's carving art which consecutively knowing in all over Indonesia and the world. According to history, he was too takes a part in the erection of mosque in Loram (a name of area in Kudus) and mosque of Menara Kudus.

Sungging Badar Duwung then devoted his skill to the surrounding community in Jepara as well as in Kudus and presented high skilled carvers that from time to time growth in numbers. This skill direct and indirect was useful in the process of developing the traditional house of Kudus.

The certainty of mentioned things were still need to be investigated furthermore. But for sure, the traditional house of Kudus has build and become one of the Kudus markers with its fabulous woodcarving.

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