Today we’d like to introduce you to Mark Johnson.
Hi Mark, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
It all started in 1976 when I read an article in Mother Earth News about a young couple that turned an old barn into a home without a mortgage. Being only 25 years old with more confidence than sense I thought it sounded like a great idea so I took the $2500 my grandfather gave me to finish college and bought 25 acres of land without a barn (I missed that part of the article). I found a barn for free and ’47 International truck for $50 and started taking down the barn to build my first home without a mortgage.
About that same time I and 3 friends started a construction company and I’m sure the first 3 houses we built are in a landfill because the lake property they were on became worth more the homes we built. This turned me away from building new to restoring older homes like a church I turned into a twin home and the one story home we lifted the roof on and turned it into a two story in one day. Eventually my love for restoration spread to historic preservation which in turn lead me to the oldest structures in the area which of course were log cabins and barns.
Fast forward 49 years and I’m happy to say I salvaged my grandparents barn, built a timber frame home out of it 7 years ago and am using the leftover timbers on our current project that involves building a new home around an 1880’s log cabin.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
In 2007 we had so much work and not enough crew leaders that I had to hire a general manager so I could be in the field on the most difficult projects. When the “great recession” hit in 2008 he decided to start his own business and stole a million dollar job along with tons of digital information one weekend and quit on Monday. To cover his tracks and make matters worse he got me into a lawsuit that cost me a lot of money and forced me to file bankruptcy.
I looked at going into insurance adjusting but the job seemed to put the insurance company ahead of the policy holder so that didn’t sit well with my conscience.
Around 2010 finally I started over with Artisan Restoration and the goal to just do new and old log home restoration as well as preserve old barns which sometimes involved rebuilding them into new timber frame homes. I worked with the local SBA office to get the business started and create this niche service that not only that suited my skills but my need for challenging and rewarding work. They were very helpful to me and it shouldn’t have been a surprise that in 2018 they gave me an award for the Encore Entrepreneur of the year for being too stubborn to hang it up at age 67 but instead started my career all over.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I think our specialty is using reclaimed materials where ever possible and practical.
What are your plans for the future?
My plans for the future are to pass on as much knowledge as possible to my employees through our work and to others through workshops. With retirement around the corner and wanting to sell the business there is so much more to pass on than just the trade skills so there is a lot of mentoring going on at all levels.
The other plan I have is to build the last home in my Terrasol Subdivision that I started 40 years ago. I coined that word by joining the Latin words for earth and sun because after the energy crisis of the early 70’s I thought our energy newly found consciousness would lead to different ways of building homes. (My first spec home was a passive solar bermed home in 1984). So this this last home will be a passive solar design using an old barn for the structure just like my first home in 1976. The only difference is that I will have more experience and more of a budget to do it without cutting corners this time. I have the barn picked out and will have the plans done in a few weeks so we can start this fall so it will be used as a model home until it is sold and finished.
Pricing:
- All of our projects are custom designed and different so there is no standard pricing
- Using reclaimed material doesn’t save much money
- Reclaimed log cabins and barns will appreciate in value as they disappear
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.artisanrestorationmn.com
- Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/artisanrestorationmn
- Youtube: @barnsandlogcabins
