How Buildings Learn: What Happens After They're Built

by Stewart Brand

Do-it-yourself home improvement is a huge, growth industry. Back in 1980 Americans spent $44 billion on home improvement materials, tools, books, etc. And that was a fraction of the real economic event; the value of the unpaid labor involved—and the final improvement value—has never been estimated. Nevertheless by 1990, ten non-inflationary years later, the annual amount spent had nearly tripled to $110 billion, and the collapse of real estate would send it higher still as people replaced trading up with fixing up.6 A book titled The Router Handbook (a router is a power tool for specialized shaping) sold 700,000 copies between 1983 and 1990—ten times greater than Witold Rybczynski’s bestseller, Home: A Short History of an Idea. Go ten times greater still to 8 million, and you have the worldwide sales since 1973 for the Reader’s Digest Complete Do-It-Yourself Manual.7 That’s the amateur work. In 1980 professional home remodeling came to $46 billion (this number includes labor). By 1990 it was $107 billion.8 There’s an interesting reversal in those numbers—in 1980 more was spent on professional remodeling than