This ninety-minute-long walking tour of the town and gardens along Palace Street in Colonial Williamsburg examines the city through the philosopher's eyes. Do gardens have meaning? Is architecture more than shelter and decoration? What role can a city play in the pursuit of wisdom? Colonial Williamsburg Good Neighbor Pass required.

America once stood for a paradise regained of boundless forest and stream: a mythic landscape preserved from the beginnings of time. In this narrated woodland walk through the majestic Bassett Woods at Colonial Williamsburg, we seek the sources of American wisdom in the ancient forests that shaped the early nation.

This ninety-minute-long walking tour of the town and gardens along Palace Street in Colonial Williamsburg examines the city through the philosopher's eyes. Do gardens have meaning? Is architecture more than shelter and decoration? What role can a city play in the pursuit of wisdom? Colonial Williamsburg Good Neighbor Pass required.

In this field trip to the woods of Surry County, we seek the sources of American home in the “Virginia House,” a transient building form now lost to history. Admixed of European, Native American, and African elements, this earliest of American dwellings is now being reconstructed using authentic historic methods and materials in the Native forests of our first minglings.

The woods are more than trees and earth and sky, the woods are a way of seeing. In this class we draw on the seven years of solitude lived in the woods at the Innermost House in California to examine our lives here in Williamsburg. What beginnings lay just beneath the surface of our lives here, hidden in the plain sight of home? Registration required.

This ninety-minute-long walking tour of the town and gardens along Palace Street in Colonial Williamsburg examines the city through the philosopher's eyes. Do gardens have meaning? Is architecture more than shelter and decoration? What role can a city play in the pursuit of wisdom? Colonial Williamsburg Good Neighbor Pass required.

This ninety-minute-long walking tour of the town and gardens along Palace Street in Colonial Williamsburg examines the city through the philosopher's eyes. Do gardens have meaning? Is architecture more than shelter and decoration? What role can a city play in the pursuit of wisdom? Colonial Williamsburg Good Neighbor Pass required.

For seven years, Diana Lorence and her husband lived alone in an unelectrified, twelve-by-twelve-foot house they built themselves, hidden in the woods of Northern California, in a world lit only by fire. Without telephone or computer, without automobile or access to stores, Diana’s Innermost Life answered her deepest need for something we have all left behind. Registration required.

Most of us assume that electricity is an unmixed good, expanding our humanity in every direction. But what can we learn for our everyday lives from an example of living with no electricity at all? Are there ways we may all know a little of the joy of powerlessness? Registration required.

Public speaking is an ancient art of leadership and power, practiced in senates and parliaments and from political platforms. But there is a completely different approach to this fundamental act of human communication that defies traditional categories: the art of speaking from your vulnerability, of leading with your weakness. In this class, we will each learn how to put the weaknesses in our life first among our strengths.

Some are born to downsize, some rise to it, and some have downsizing thrust upon them. In this course we will examine the motives and means of downsizing today, concentrating on the one method that yields enduring happiness: living only with what you love.
Registration required.

For seven years, Diana Lorence and her husband lived in an unelectrified, twelve-by-twelve-foot house they built themselves, hidden in the woods without power of any kind, in a world lit only by fire. What Diana did in her way, we may do in our own. We each see something of ourselves in Diana's beautiful story.  We all have an Innermost Life. 

It is said that public speaking is American’s greatest fear. In this single-session course, we will explore the gentle art of speaking in public from a new point of view. Each of us will have an opportunity to stand up (or sit down) and address our own group for a moment. All shall be well!

Please join Diana Lorence at the beautiful Williamsburg Landing for this special presentation and celebration of Henry Thoreau’s two hundred and second year. There will be pictures and words and questions and answers as we examine together the life of the patron saint of American simplicity.

From the beginning, the woods have haunted the American imagination. The woods mean self-reliance to us, they mean independence. The woods mean renewal. The woods mean solitude and silence and peace. Please join Diana and Michael Lorence for this philosophical and artistic look into the American woods of our imagination.

You are Invited to join us at Diana’s seventh annual appearance at the Thoreau Society's Annual Gathering in Concord, Massachusetts, to discuss fire as the fundamental technology of Walden, informing all other aspects of domestic life. For information about tickets and the rest of the program, please visit the Thoreau Society website.

You are invited to join us in beautiful Lafayette, California for this free evening of stories, pictures, questions and answers as Diana Lorence of Innermost House presents "The Joy of Small House Living." This event is generously sponsored by the Lafayette Community Library and Learning Center, with special thanks to Vickie Sciacca and Amy Pipkin.

Some are born to downsize, some rise to it, and some have downsizing thrust upon them. In this course we will examine the motives and means of downsizing today, concentrating on the one method that yields enduring happiness: living only with what you love.
Registration required.

Cabin Fever explores the history and meaning of this most American of architectural forms, from its antecedents in Europe and Asia, to Native American and colonial beginnings, to the feverish enthusiasm it enjoys today. What do cabins have to do with being American?
Registration required.

Innermost House represents the universal archetype of retirement in search of happiness and peace. Please join us for this special presentation examining the promise and pleasures of retirement through the lens of “Life in the Woods.”

The search for a simpler life has a long and distinguished history in America, from its colonial beginnings to the present day.  This final meeting of a three-week course will examine the practical possibilities of a simpler and happier life through the lens of the Far West, John Muir and Ansel Adams. Registration required.

The search for a simpler life has a long and distinguished history in America, from its colonial beginnings to the present day.  This second meeting of a three-week course will examine the practical possibilities of a simpler and happier life through the lens of Walden, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry Thoreau. Registration required.

The search for a simpler life has a long and distinguished history in America, from its colonial beginnings to the present day.  This first meeting of a three-week course will examine the practical possibilities of a simpler and happier life through the lens of Thomas Jefferson and historic Virginia. Registration required.

You are invited to join us in historic Pasadena, California for this free afternoon of stories, pictures and conversation as Diana Lorence presents "Innermost House and the Ideal of Simplicity: a Talk on Tiny Houses and Happiness." This event is generously sponsored by the Pasadena Public Library, with special thanks to Ms. Christine Reeder. 

You are invited to join us in beautiful Costa Mesa, California for this free morning of stories, pictures and conversation as Diana Lorence presents "Seven Years in the Woods: A True Story of Tiny Houses, Simplicity and Happiness." This event is generously sponsored by the Costa Mesa Public Library, with special thanks to Ms. Nancy Pe'a. 

You are invited to join us in beautiful Cypress, California for this free morning of stories, pictures and conversation as Diana Lorence presents "Innermost House and the Ideal of Simplicity: a Talk on Tiny Houses and Happiness." This event is generously sponsored by the Cypress Public Library, with special thanks to Mr. Stanley Wang and Ms. Cyrise Smith.

You are Invited to join us at the beautiful Colonial Inn in historic Concord, Massachusetts, as Diana Lorence presents "Is Thoreavian Love Sustainable?," a talk in words and pictures about time, eternity and a tolerable future. For information about tickets and the rest of the program, please visit the Thoreau Society website.

You are invited to join us in historic Williamsburg, Virginia for an afternoon of conversation, questions and answers as we explore the foundations of the tiny house movement in the archetype of the "Primitive Hut" as exemplified by Innermost House.  This event is generously sponsored by the William & Mary Department of Art and Art History.

You are Invited to join us at the beautifully restored Thoreau Birthplace Farm in historic Concord, Massachusetts, as Diana and Michael Lorence present "I Love to Be Alone: A Valentine for Henry David Thoreau." This event is generously sponsored by Thoreau Farm and the Thoreau Society.

You are invited to join us in beautiful Lafayette, California for this free afternoon of stories, pictures, questions and answers as Diana Lorence of Innermost House presents "Loving the Tiny House Life." This event is generously sponsored by the Lafayette Community Library and Learning Center, with special thanks to Vickie Sciacca and Amy Pipkin.