Here are a three quotes from a chapter entitled "Building-In Soul." What they have in common, aside from that abstract thing the author calls 'soul', is the relation of the house to nature.
Buildings are substantive -- what they are made of is very much part of their character. Wood, earth, brick, concrete, steel, glass or plastic buildings are totally different from each other to see, to live in, to build and in the forms their construction logically and characterfully demands. . . . So, very important in terms of their pollution and environmental costs, are their manufacturing biographies and how they end their life -- do they return to nature or become refuse?
Not coincidentally, wood is a material from life. Iron is from the earth, but by way of intense heat and heavy industrial rolling. Plastic is from oil and coal deep beneath its surface, after so numerous chemical synthesis operations that it is totally removed from life. These materials connect us to the world from whence they came: living and life-cycle bound by nature, or lifeless, dead industrial processes. Whereas plastic needs industrial equipment suited to mass production to form, wood needs only a pocket knife. It is more appealing, accessible and healthy to work with. Indeed, you can put your heart into what you make out of it.
We use thousands of materials in modern building, but a general rule is that the nearer something is to life, the more compatible it is: the healthier to live with, the more recyclable back to earth, thence living matter again. It also needs more care for longevity -- but this care, like the care given to its making, is imprinted into its substance and emanates from it, to nourish those who live next to it.
