Biography

 

Quentin Wilson chose adobe to make house models in the fifth grade. By the seventh grade he made full-size adobe bricks in his Albuquerque back yard. In 1970 he moved to Ojo Caliente with Maria and raised three children in a run-down, abandoned adobe home which the family reclaimed, renovated, modernized and enlarged. After teaching high school and college math for 5 years, he began to earn his living in solar adobe construction beginning with project management and construction instruction for the Sundwellings Demonstration Project built with 18 students at Ghost Ranch in 1976. His mentor was Peter van Dresser. Following that, he built adobe homes for 25 years as a licensed general contractor while continuing to teach evening and weekend solaradobe classes throughout the Southwest. In 1995, Quentin organized the Department of Southwest Construction at Northern New Mexico Community College while tapering off his construction business. Now beginning their ninth year, the adobe classes represent the only full-time adobe construction program in the USA. After 35 years the family homestead is now quite ready for a new cycle of renovation and a second bathroom.

 

"To be is to do"--Socrates.
"To do is to be"--Jean-Paul Sartre.
"Do be do be do"--Frank Sinatra.
"Do adobe"--Quentin Wilson

 

The first three lines is a famous quote by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. 
The fourth line is from a student from Colorado of whom I have lost contact.