Cork doesn’t pop up as a building material all that often—but the finish was a natural fit for Alyson Fox and Derek Dollahite as they updated an ’80s cabin on the Oregon coast. “It’s antimicrobial, hydrophobic, fire resistant, and it works as insulation,” says Derek. The couple sourced hundreds of linear feet of cork panels and applied them inside and out as they hand built an addition to the main house, a studio, and a shed. You can see exactly how they did it in our Construction Diary video:

The completed home isn’t your typical cabin—it’s a testament to the duo’s DIY skills, and it feels like a fresh take on the typology. “Inside, we were going for the feel of a Japanese beach house of an unknown era,” says Alyson. “We used cork for the floors, the living room walls, and the built-in bed upstairs.” We’ll cheers to that.

—Mike Chino, Senior Design Editor

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