David Branccaccio

If a single contractor could frame in five houses in the same time with the same labor as one...

you could replace a neighborhood much more quickly.

So it's fascinating to entertain the notion that this traditional technique would, using newer technology of pressing these smaller boards together,

And with that lamination, you get a very strong chunk of wood that gets put into place quickly.

So that's just one technique.

But it's not the only technique I'm seeing in the Altadena neighborhood where we lived.

Other people are trying different things.

Well, there's a lovely woman named Heidi Lewis.

She worked in Hollywood as a scene painter and has done a lot of other cool creative things.

And I went over to her site and it looked like a big pile of very white Lego that had arrived off a truck.

Styrofoam looks, you know, maybe it's not actually styrofoam, but it looks like a styrofoam cup type material.

And they snap them into position and

as the outer walls of the house.

So she's going to live in a plastic house that's like, no.

They pour concrete in between the panels.

And so she's building a concrete house.

I'll tell you what, fire's not going to get through that concrete.

And Heidi, she found a builder who was experienced with this stuff.

And she's actually about a third built already.

This is what she told me.