Left To Burn

A newsletter about how I plan to rebuild

My immediate family lost two homes in the Palisades fire: One, I designed and built. The other, my parents’ home of 45 years, the house I was born and raised in.

I plan to rebuild both.

My family was fortunate to have moved — a year before the Palisades fire — to another home in the Palisades that survived. We didn’t even consider selling the home that burned as it was incredibly special to us. We chose to move despite loving the house realizing (during covid) our young children would benefit more from a big yard than a house that perfectly suited our (the adults) aesthetic and dwelling related preferences.

None of this is particularly interesting or novel, nor would I normally share it publicly under my real name, but I do believe it is vital context. The ideas I plan to present here will not rely on claims of authority or expertise, they will be justified by logic and a first principles approach. When evaluating my reasoning, some will ultimately come to question my motives for sharing it, and I hope they do. My hope in sharing some part of my personal story, is that the actual substance of what I write will be believed as my true and honest opinion.

So then, why Left To Burn?

On January 7th, my family left the Palisades to burn. We didn’t realize it, nor did we realize that our firefighters would also be forced to leave it to burn, nor that our mayor had already left days before, and our utility months before. I’ve run over the events of that day countless times, paid close attention to the reactions, considered all possible futures ad nauseam. To rebuild in the Palisades I cannot escape the fact that probabilistically the Palisades will be left to burn, again.

Once I accepted this, and still decided to rebuild, the question I was forced to answer became: how do I rebuild?

Driving around the Alphabet Streets today, it seems most do not share this realization or my level of concern, and this too must be accepted. I am encouraged by some of the techniques I see: fiberglass faced gypsum sheathing (“Densglass”), steel framing, and some with vinyl signs promising active fire protection systems. I also believe these early houses do not naturally select for caution, and in a way I am grateful to see so much construction, of any kind, so quickly. No doubt it will inspire others to start.

I want to do my part. Because of my unique experience and passion for building, and my tenacious problem solving mentality, I hope to share how I conclude what is and isn’t appropriate for my houses. There is no “one size fits all” approach here. My ideas might not work for all houses or all budgets. They may be too extreme for some, and inadequate for others. My hope is the information and reasoning recorded here can help others in a similar situation. If no one reads this it will still serve as a useful tool to internally refine and justify my own approach.