We know that custom builders are a varied lot, but a surprising number of those we meet match a rather distinct profile. They are in their 40s to late 50s, grew up in middle class families, and came to building pursuing an ideal of traditional craftsmanship. Part of this is due to simple demographics. Builders who have risen through the ranks, started a business, and achieved enough success to draw the attention of a national magazine may well be pushing 50. Working backward from there gives you a starting date in the 1970s, a time when the back-to-the-land movement and the revival of traditional crafts still held considerable cachet. A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then. Contemporary back-to-the-landers, for one thing, might hold out for a tepee with WiFi access. And it is in this drastically different cultural environment that the current generation of custom builders must find and groom the generation that will someday take its place. How are young people finding their way to custom building? We asked some respected custom builders, and their answers reflect a scene that is in many ways new, yet in some important ways the same as it ever was.
At 53, Seattle custom builder Scott Jennings fits the demographic profile above. And while he was drawn to building as a business opportunity rather than a path to enlightenment, he sees the remnants of the craftsman’s ethic all around him. “The current group of builders that we compete with came out of that movement,” he says. “A lot of the people who work for me did, and they really set the tone for the company.” Jennings sees the same love of craft in the young people coming into the trades today. “I think that’s still alive. My son has two friends who started a metalworking company, and it’s with the same passion and interest that inspired my generation.” Jennings observes that today’s young tradesmen benefit from the mentors that their fathers often lacked. “Our generation, we were figuring out how to do it. A lot of it had been lost.” But if the enthusiasm, idealism, and opportunity are still there, Jennings says, the numbers are not. “We’re constantly trying to find people who get it, who get what we do.” There seem to be plenty of hands capable of doing production housing, “But there aren’t that many people who understand how to add quality to the mix. Craft, really.” One reason may be a change in the focus of vocational education: “There’s virtually no training available,” Jennings says. “You look at a lot of the schools, and they’ve developed huge culinary programs. But there isn’t an emphasis on the [building] trades.”
So where is the new blood coming from? Often, from unexpected sources. “The young guys that we’re hiring are refugees from other professional job positions,” says San Rafael, Calif., builder David Warner. One of Warner’s recent hires was a senior vice president at a local bank. The two had known each other for several years when the man told Warner, “You’re going to be surprised, but I want to be a carpenter.” He said he wanted to have something tangible to show for his day’s work. Another was a high school biology teacher who went to a green building conference and got inspired. Now he’s also a carpenter for Warner’s company, which specializes in green building. A third, Warner says, was “an architect who wanted to move to the trade side.” One of his managers started as an accountant for Deloitte & Touche. “He gets to wear jeans to work,” Warner says. “He’s got a tool belt even. He’ll never go back to accounting.” Warner says he still looks for “the regular guys who are just great carpenters. But those guys are hard to find in our environment.” He blames the declining social status of the construction trades. A lot of the older guys who work for his company remember taking woodshop in school. How many parents today want to see their kid in wood-shop instead of the computer lab? “That connection to the trade is gone now.”
