How to Build a Cabin Retreat According to Us, People That Have No Idea

Howdy-ho, friend-o! Here’s the history of Howdybrook and the people behind it! It only gets more obnoxious from here, so buckle up. Also, it's long. It's very long. Optimum word count for SEO is like... way more words than you'd expect.

Our Story: The Howdybrooks

We (John and Lauren) met at the giant university in the heart of Ohio, and planted our flag in Columbus thereafter. Columbus keeps us busy and we appreciate that we can get city perks without the soul-crushing traffic.

Our jobs are sedentary, but our interests are not. Our best days are when we’re active outside. And unfortunately, while Columbus has a lot going for it, it’s not the poster child for outdoor adventures. The Scioto is no Lake Tahoe.

Also, our surnames are Howdyshell and Holbrook. In case you were wondering.

Hocking Hills

Minimizing the Commute to Maximize the Fleeting Weekends

John was on a Zillow safari, exploring vacant lands in unrealistic time zones. Building an outpost in a natural playground was an interesting idea. Having that outpost be a flight away? Erhm. I’m seeing snake infestation, hurricane damage, and other worst case scenarios that we’re going to struggle to manage from 1,000 miles away.

We ended up setting our sights on Hocking Hills. We’d talked before about the possibility of building a cabin there eventually. At only an hour away, it meant we could be there all the time. It could serve as a base camp for the weekend outdoorsin’.

In the fall of 2020, we settled on a plot on the north end of Hocking Hills. Reducing that commute from Columbus is the difference between arriving while the sun is still strutting or dodging deer in the dark.

Making it Happen

We were lucky to have bought a house back when the Columbus market was a little more reasonable. I think we even paid slightly under asking - remember when that was a thing? So we had enough equity in our Columbus residence to turn into a downpayment for the Hocking Hills adventure.

I'm making this sound easier than it was. But I'm not Dave Ramsey and the details are boring.

Building a Cabin

It's On Like Donkey Kong

We didn't quite grasp how many weekends we'd be pouring into this project before we even got to the groundbreaking.

You’ve seen those head-scratching houses that look like they were designed by a raccoon with autoCAD? All roof and a bunch of random peaks where they’re fitting in custom features without thinking about cohesion? We were really trying to avoid that. Which was hard because we’ve got more in common with the raccoons with autoCAD than with an architect.

We studied lots and lots of homes by professionals. Books. Our BFF YouTube. And of course, we looked to our Columbus home - where we know what we liked and also what we would have done differently had we been around in 1960s to influence the build.

Our game plan was to keep it small and intentional. We already had the Columbus casa to look after, so this extra space had to earn its keep. It's all about the essentials – top-notch, no-nonsense stuff that we'd actually use. Small enough to keep you focused, large enough to have breathing room. The Goldilocks.

Our mandatories:

• A primary entrance that is utilitarian. In other words, the front door needs to open to a dropzone. Not a styled foyer or the living room. Shoes/coats/muddy dogs have to go somewhere in this small house, so having a plan to keep that contained.

• 2 bedrooms so we can share pleasant cabin weekends with friends and family. A pleasant weekend means everyone is able to retreat to their own space when they want. So no open loft bedrooms.

• 2 full bathrooms. We knew that when working with the small footprint it was going to be tempting to reduce to a single bathroom, but we needed to remember that a key to comfortably sharing space and time is counterbalancing that with enough personal space.

• A kitchen with a lot of countertop space. In our travel experience, we’ve never used a pantry. Gotta have direct access to snacks, so planning accordingly.

• A living room that practically gives Mother Nature a high-five. We want the cabin to generally promote time outdoors, but this would be a critical element of that main shared space.

We put pen to paper and sketched out every variation of the floor-plan to fit in the 28x28 footprint and meet our needs. Our builder also helped us with finding little nooks to maximize the space, and pointing out that closets were probably not a bad idea.

Building an Experience

Kitsch without the Clutter

We wanted a sanctuary where the hustle of the workweek can take a backseat as soon as you walk through the doors. Our vision for achieving that was a playful fusion of fresh and familiar.

Seamlessly blending a clutter-free, grown-up aesthetic with some nostalgic charm from our carefree childhood days of camping and video games. It was also important to create indoor-outdoor harmony. Making it outdoorsy without making it heavy, rustic, and overly “cabiny”. You know what I’m talking about.

So we mixed drywall with the traditional logs. We went with lots of windows and sliding doors to blur the lines between inside and outside. And when making style choices, we steered toward natural materials like leather, stone, wool, and wood.

With moodboards in hand, we tried to build the desired vibe. You won’t find any generic "live-laugh-love" clichés here. It’s an authentic reflection of our personalities - with whimsical midwestern art we love and some colorful custom pieces we made.

In the meantime, our Columbus house turned into a storage haven, stuffed to the brim with a second house worth of stuff. We were surrounded by all the clutter, and this was our experience for many more months than we could have anticipated. 😬

Evolving the Experience

Fine-tuning the Art of the Perfect Weekend Getaway

March 2023 marked the completion of our charming cabin. Spending every weekend there for the next few months allowed us to identify and stock the place with everything needed to craft memorable moments and achieve a relaxing escape.

We added a firepit, threw in a frisbee golf basket, cooked a lot of food to make sure we had the kitchen essentials, and got the glorious StarLink internet. (We appreciate and value being able to disconnect, but having high-speed internet was the secret sauce to allowing us to stretch the duration of our time at the cabin.)

Embracing the newfound luxury of proximity, we became expert explorers of Hocking Hills. No longer confined to the once-every-other-year schedule, we ventured out regularly, checking out all the cool stuff that we had been saving for “next time”.

We’re biased, but the cabin is pretty awesome. We love it. It’s everything we wanted. It’s easy to adventure outdoors here (kayaking, hiking, climbing, etc), and it’s easy to slip into the chill, carefree atmosphere of Cabin Weekend.

We're on a mission to unlock every facet of joy this space offers. And we're absolutely thrilled to open our cabin's doors and share this happy little oasis in the woods with all who cross its threshold.

See you next weekend? - John, Lauren, Ziggy, and Major