A returnee from Italy and a man with a vision, Tefik Tefikoski, nicknamed “Tutto” has been working for several years on an exciting project in his native village of Jance, in the National Park Mavrovo. An expert in construction - he ran his own construction company in Italy for over 15 years – Tefik has launched a project of restoring old houses in Jance and elsewhere in the country. He uses only natural materials and reconstructs the houses in their original, traditional look. Literally by himself, and with his own resources, he started a venture a few years ago which is already placing Jance on the map as a resort for rural tourism. Others have started to follow suit. An energetic entrepreneur, Tefik is enthusiastic about tradition and the environment. This year the Chamber of Crafts of Macedonia recognized him for his work with traditional construction.
What are your projects at the moment?
We are developing a project involving the restoration of several “bačila” [traditional sheepfolds]. I will discuss the project in Florence with people from the Slow Food Movement who might perhaps help with finding donors for the project. The bačila should be restored with their original design and using only local and natural materials, such as straw, stone, and earth.
You have been doing a lot of seminar teaching lately?
Yes indeed. I have also been promoting the idea to make Jance, where I already have my workshop, a place where students of architecture could come and do practical work with ecological construction materials. This would be a great experience for the students. They could get a chance to work directly on restoring old houses, some of them over 200 years old. All the materials needed are available locally and they are all natural; the area abounds with stone and earth of excellent quality.
A documentary was made about your work recently?
It was part of a development project run by a local NGO in partnership with the region of Lower Normandy in France. It focused on the techniques of ecological restoration and construction. Next June I should go to France for a series of workshops there.
When did you first start working with natural construction materials?
A long time ago. I entered into construction as a young teen, around the age of 12-13. It was a way to support myself through school. I joined a group of “majstori” [a commonly used term for a team of construction workers]. In ’82 I moved to Gostivar to start high school and I continued to work there, in the afternoons after school. Our “majstori” Rekanci [from Mavrovo] had a good reputation throughout the former Yugoslavia. They did a lot of construction work along the [Adriatic] coast. Construction has a long tradition in our Rekanski region. In ’88 I went abroad, first to Germany, and from there, in ’92 I moved to Italy, where I stayed until recently. Construction was experiencing a boom in Italy at that time. Many construction workers from my country went to Italy. There, I further improved my skills. I was lucky to join a team of old Italian construction craftsmen who were specialists in traditional ways of building. I worked with them for 3-4 years.
I already had some knowledge about traditional construction, and I complemented it with what I learned in Italy. In the past, houses in my home village of Jance were built of earth, stone, and wood and some of them are more than 200 years old. A lot of the construction there involved also modern materials, which are perhaps easier to work with and cheaper, but they are artificial, chemical. With time I stopped working with them as I did not like them. I saw that some clients in the north of Italy were looking for craftsmen who could work with traditional materials. There are many old houses there, and their owners had difficulty finding craftsmen with the necessary skills, as most of the builders worked with modern prefabricates. I focused on this niche of the market. My team and I worked with these materials and we worked manually, initially because I could not afford to buy the machinery, but also because I realized that customers were interested in this and were willing to pay a higher price for such work.
What is the difference between traditional construction and ecological construction?
Nowadays many houses are built with cement; the foundation is from cement, and even the walls. Cement is susceptible to humidity, it absorbs it easily but it releases it slowly. In the past, the traditional way was to use brewage, and other natural materials, not just for the foundations but the entire construction. Back then they did not have cement. They used brewage, in Italy they call it calce Romana, and they also used a lot of sand. I worked in Europe a lot. I never saw anyone working with sand. You can only see sand in the very old houses. So we started promoting it, particularly the Italian group ANAB; I became their associate, and I was regularly in charge of the practical work at their seminars.
Some five years ago I rented a hall and conducted a lot of experimental work with earth. I realized that earth was not only good in terms of structure, but also good for regulation of humidity in the object, for thermic isolation, and in addition, it is a great isolator of sound. For example, if you see some of the houses in Jance, their wooden beams are perfectly preserved after 200 years, and they have been only isolated with earth. Water only comes inside if the roof is, for example, physically damaged and the beams are therefore affected by humidity. These houses are evidence that construction with earth is durable, that objects built of earth last. This is part of the reason I returned. I wanted to continue this tradition. These are objects which were built ecologically, from locally available materials, earth, wood, and rock. Some of the earth available there is of excellent quality, it can become extremely solid.
It is important to preserve the tradition. Many people from my region migrated and worked abroad for 30 years or more. Often, when they came back, they would knock down their old houses and build these new ones, made of prefabs. They would destroy these great old houses with solid walls, and would build with cement. The new houses would become soaked with humidity over a couple of decades, and be ready for reconstruction, whereas the old ones are still good.
When did you decide to return, to start reconstructing old houses in Mavrovo? How did this come about?
I sometimes feel I have never left... (laughs). In Italy I realized the importance of rural development and the prospects rural regions can have. Here, the area of the National Park Mavrovo has an abundance of resources. God has given this land everything. We only need the knowledge to use these resources well. So I sold my house in Italy, in Barbisano. I had built it, restored it myself. It had everything; a swimming pool, gardens...it was wonderful. I often worked till midnight and later to build it. And then I sold it. I realized that a certain type of happiness you can only find at home.
So first you built your bed & breakfast and restaurant, and then you continued with restoration of old houses?
Actually, when I returned I first started restoring houses. Then I realized that tourists who would come to Jance would also need a place to have a meal. So I built the ethno-restaurant. I did not plan for it to become this large at first. It came out spontaneously...
What is the prospect of tourism in the Mavrovo region?
We have no subsidies... We need better roads, promotion, we need to provide services for tourists, such as create hiking tracks...but I am convinced that over the long term there are good perspectives. I would not be investing otherwise. I see many of our migrants abroad showing an interest in coming back and investing....
What should we do to take better care of this country's architectural heritage, for example, old houses such the ones you are restoring in Jance?
We need a kind of a cultural shift, a change in our frame of mind. The country is full of old houses such as these in Jance; many of them have been abandoned; people migrated abroad or went to Skopje to live in tiny flats. We need to restore the tradition; I am planning to organize workshops to refresh the memory of traditional construction. We once had that knowledge, only we have forgotten it over the years. This is economically sound, it is respectful of the environment – we use local materials and do not need transport, which means we do not create emissions; and it is culturally important.
**The European Commission does not accept or recognise in whatever form or content a denomination other than “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”. All references, direct or indirect, to this country used in this article are those of its author.
