Ideas for building an affordable planet-friendly home, minus the pomp and pricetag.
Want to live in a beautiful, light-filled, energy-efficient home with minimal bills and maximum joy, all while unshackling from the bank? We show you how!
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11,000+
Sustainable house-loving tribe members
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1,000+
Design Packs being used to build better
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16
Countries all around the world
Hey there! We’re Lisa & Boots
A few years back, we designed and built a good-lookin’ off-grid home on a tight budget. The love it received here on the web nearly knocked our socks off, so we decided to start Booken Blend, a DIY sustainable housing movement that is now reaching a global audience (how cool is that?!).
We’re not architects or builders — that’s why we can share practical, 100% independent, jargon-free info - but we have clocked thousands of hours within the sustainable housing trenches and we believe that simple, passive home design knowledge should be accessible to all.
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Featured in
Realestate.com.au
Inside Out Mag
Herald Sun
Sustainable House Day
Homes to Love
Our Home Magazine
Schoner Wohnen Magazine
Realestate.com.au Inside Out Mag Herald Sun Sustainable House Day Homes to Love Our Home Magazine Schoner Wohnen Magazine
Let’s get you skilled up
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Start Here!
Get your mitts on our famous free Sustainable Build Checklist. It includes 12 key steps you must consider first, whether you’re building from scratch or renovating a sh*t-shack. This info is crucial, it’s why we give it away free.
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Booken House Design Packs
Shortcut your own build by accessing the exact specs and floor plan we used to build our planet-friendly Booken House. Adaptable to any country or climate.
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Simple Sustainable Build Workshops
The deep dive! All our 15+ years of sustainable build knowledge, packed into a straight-talking course on planning, designing and building your own sustainable home. Online or in-person at our place, you choose.
Upcoming sustainable building workshops
Join hundreds of folks worldwide taking charge of their own planning and design – and saving a ton of money in the process – inside our Booken Workshop.
MISSION
To accelerate the world’s transition to low-impact homes and lifestyles that feel good and do good
Booken Blend is a global DIY sustainable housing movement sharing simple low-cost eco-friendly design principles — so everyday folk can build better, consume less and live more.
Meet our tribe
Folks all around the world are already using our simple sustainable build tips to create their own low-cost, on-budget, energy-efficient and totally unique homes — in Australia, New Zealand, the US, the UK, South Africa and beyond.
Trending on the journal
Get the good stuff
Get the good stuff
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You don’t need to be an expert to build your own sustainable home… but you DO need key information to make good planet-friendly decisions. Here’s a bunch of free resources to get you started…
Don’t start building without this checklist!
Our ultimate freebie! Whether you’re building or renovating, you need our Sustainable Build Checklist in your hot little hands, like now. This cheeky downloadable outlines 12 must-knows when creating an affordable, sustainable home, helping you avoid (or at least minimise…) the tears, tantrums and budget blow-outs. These principles, rooted in simple science, include orientation, cross-ventilation, thermal mass, zoning, shading and insulation. Go get the checklist now — it’s completely free. No catches or strings, just good, honest info.
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“You’ve inspired me to build our own sustainable, passive-designed family home.”
Prior to this, I thought it was only possible if you were a millionaire or wanted to build a tiny house (I don’t want to do that either). Thank you!
— Katelyn, Goulburn Valley, Victoria
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“The way Lisa advocates for affordable and sustainable homes is inspiring.”
Small sustainable changes and decisions by LOTS of people will make a BIG impact.
— Cheree, Brisbane, Queensland
Take a tour of our off-grid home, designed around the sun on beautiful Yorta Yorta Country
Get the Booken House floor plans + more
Love the look of Booken House and wanna dive under the hood?
Our Design Packs give you access to the exact documentation and floor plan we used to build Booken House — all of which can be easily adjusted to wherever you live in the world. We’re thrilled to share this straight-talking knowledge with you to help fasttrack your way to beautiful, efficient, light-filled home.
For everyday folk wanting to build or renovate a home, in any style or location. Custom homes, volume builds or even renovating a small west-facing shitshack :)
Right now, good sustainable housing design is frustratingly difficult for us everyday folks to access. We miss the opportunity to incorporate smart, affordable passive design principles into our homes because it all seems too hard. Or we’re told by professional builders and architects that ‘We can do it, but it’s gonna cost you’. (Cue: eyeroll…)
But really, many sustainable housing principles are based on simple, straight-forward science. And when you know how to leverage nature’s free resources (think sun and breeze), you can slash your ongoing bills, enhance your family’s comfort year-round and create a light-filled beauty of a home. All while minimising your environmental impact.
Our greatest hope is that the resources and stories we share at Booken Blend make sustainable homes more accessible to people like you and me.
Living off the grid is the bomb (I mean, zero electricity bills and minimal impact on the planet is pretty cool), but the bit that no one tells you is - you don’t actually have to live off-grid to access many of the benefits.