Rewilding begins with an act of creative letting go—honoring a home once deeply lived in and loved, while reimagining the delicate boundary between house and landscape.
Fairlawn, once a home in East Aurora, NY, is now a relict in the landscape—an evolving study of deconstruction, material reuse, weathering, afforestation, and rewilding.
GRACEFUL DEPARTURE
By Chelsea Kashan
White planes, plaster
Blend into a background cloud
The crickets are just a whisper, from the round table
The wind is light and the blinds are up, recharging
Peaceful but pieces
of plaster walls crumble
Evidence of time
The beginning of an end
It’s a welcomed contradiction
We look, wander, wonder
What will stay and what to let go
A reversal of order, from 20 years known
Lets eat! A feast
For bees, flies, our eyes
Fixed on elongated views
That glide over water like dragonflies
We raise our socks
Traverse eye level meadows
Joe-pye-weed, Queen Anne’s Lace
Tulip poplar, Norway spruce
Calmly lost at sea
But ready for a destination, a loop
A Horse doesn’t behave
On dead ends.
Neither does time
White plaster, cracked + blue
Crushed glass, filled pool exposed beams, punctured plaster
Inside out, a habitat to rewild
The land is still, worked
Compacted, and grown
Grounded with memory, and images in a book
The shadow is artist
Is it a story to tell
or one to teach?
A material ensemble
in question
The future is long, our minds venture far
200 years, for who?
I’ll be out next month
My graceful departure
The bus, the trees, and the deer who eat
The past stories pivot to one untold
A land that researches + Artists
Would gather to see
The goat barn is home
Shredding snake skin on
Stone walls
That will certainly remain?
PROJECT TIMELINE
House Construction
Completion: 2007
House lived and loved:
2007 - 2025
Deconstruction & Rewilding
Design Plan: 2024-2025
House Deconstruction:
Spring-Summer 2026
Material Repurposing
On-site: Summer 2026
Plant Miyawaki Forest & Deconstructed House Ruins: Fall 2026
Miyawaki Forest – projected
climax forest: 2041-2066
Miyawaki Forest – projected
self-sufficiency: 2029
Rewilded landscape &
place of study: 2026+
