Six years later, I was finally able to read about Tremayne’s “decommodified life” in her fresh-off-the-press book, The Good Life Lab: Radical Experiments in Hands-On Living. Captivating right from the start, Tremayne’s tale of quitting her job as creative director of a marketing firm to “live in the waste stream” describes her bumps and triumphs in turning an RV park into their homestead and living a rich life spending almost no money. Both from the city, she and her husband learn as they go, using found and tossed materials to build structures on their property, driving a car that runs on vegetable oil, growing their own food, concocting homemade tinctures from local plants, and landscaping with homemade compost and free dung from a local camel named Stanley.
Tremayne weaves her narrative with colorful charts, beautiful illustrations by different artists, and loads of how-to projects (DIY biofuel, roasting coffee with a popcorn maker, building a decorative fire barrel, making mead, and constructing a sturdy and handsome papercrete dome, just to name a few). Whether for inspiration or as a road map to creating your own off-the-grid homestead, Tremayne’s book is a must read for any maker who fantasizes about stepping off the consumer-centered treadmill and into a life that is connected to nature, unhurried and meaningful.
— Carla Sinclair