hammerstone

At Hammerstone, the tiny-house building course includes learning some trigonometry: how to calculate the slope of a roof and how long the materials must be, based on that angle.

The three schools arose independently of one another; Hammerstone and Wild Abundance launched about a decade ago.

In class at Hammerstone, we talk about the reasons women are interested in these courses, whether it’s because they were corralled into cooking class instead of shop in school; because our fathers or brothers didn’t think to teach us these skills; or simply because persistent cultural tropes tell girls from a young age that carpentry is for boys.

The other women in my class at Hammerstone talk about this, too — having fathers or spouses who wouldn’t teach them or who would just do it for them, or feeling frustrated when men overexplain small details.

“It just feels a lot safer to learn from a woman,” said Alexandra Haynes, 30, a web developer who took the tiny-house course with me at Hammerstone and who hopes to build her own cottage in the woods someday.