Timber Frame Community Healing Space

I am building a timber frame structure on the farm to serve as a nature-based retreat space—one where I and other practitioners can offer holistic medical care, education, meditation, and small group gatherings, with uninterrupted views of open fields, trees, and sunrise. The intention is to create a quiet, grounded environment for healing and learning, free from visual and environmental distraction.

When I first shared my hope of building a dedicated structure for my hyperbaric chamber with Allen Judy—master timber frame craftsman and co-owner of Heirloom Fungi with his wife, Mandy—he simply said, “We need to talk.”

Allen has built more than a hundred timber frame structures across the country. After seeing the land and hearing the vision, he generously offered to design and hand-cut the frame himself. Each beam will be precisely measured and chiseled so the structure comes together on crane day like a carefully engineered, full-scale wooden puzzle. His tolerance for error, he jokes, is “the tip of a pencil.”

The planned structure will be 26’ x 26’, providing space for acupuncture and craniosacral therapy treatments, a hyperbaric chamber, small meditation and tai chi groups, and educational seminars in Food as Medicine and related holistic topics. Five-foot by five-foot windows will wrap the space, bringing light and landscape into the room throughout the day. Radiant hydronic floor heating is planned to support year-round use during Missouri winters, and the cross-footing trenches will be engineered for long-term structural integrity.

This project is being built with community in mind, and volunteer support is welcome.

Adopt-a-Beam Fundraiser

$500
Your name, dedication, or personalized message will be wood-burned into a structural timber beam, becoming a permanent part of the building’s history and story.

In addition to the Adopt-a-Beam program, I will be hosting a fundraising sale on January 3rd at my Columbia office, featuring over one hundred carefully selected items. A sale list with photos and descriptions is available upon request.

I will be documenting the building process through an ongoing blog as the project unfolds.

Allen and Mandy have generously provided guidance, craftsmanship, and oversight throughout the planning process. Below are images from one of Allen’s previous timber frame designs that inspired this project.