The History of the Yurt: From Steppe Dwelling to Modern Home
When you step inside a modern yurt, you are stepping into one of the oldest and most successful building designs in the world. For many centuries, the round, portable homes of Central Asia's nomadic herders sheltered families through scorching summers and bitter winters on the open steppe. Today the same basic idea – a lattice wall, roof poles and a central ring – is used for homes, studios, camps and rentals around the world. Here is how the yurt traveled from the steppe to the woods of New England.
A Home Built for Life on the Move
The steppes of Central Asia are vast grasslands with extreme weather and few trees. The herding peoples who lived there moved with their animals between seasonal pastures, so they needed a home that was strong, warm and easy to take down, carry and put up again. The answer was a round, felt-covered tent built on a collapsible wooden frame. A family could dismantle it, load it onto pack animals or carts and raise it again at a new camp in a matter of hours.
Ger, Yurt and Other Names
In Mongolia the dwelling is called a ger, and that is still the everyday word used there. The English word "yurt" comes from Turkic languages, where it originally referred to a homeland or dwelling place rather than to the tent itself. Similar round, portable homes have been used across a wide region, from Turkey and the Caucasus through Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Mongolia, and each culture developed its own names, decorations and building details.
How a Traditional Yurt Is Built
Traditional yurts share a few key parts, and you will recognize every one of them in a modern yurt.
The lattice wall
The wall is made of wooden slats tied or pinned together in a crisscross pattern that folds up like an accordion for transport and expands to form a circle. In Mongolian it is called the khana.
The roof poles
Long poles run from the top of the lattice wall to a central ring, forming the cone of the roof. Their outward push on the wall is held in check by a band around the top of the lattice – the same tension principle that a steel cable provides in a modern yurt.
The crown
The central ring, called the toono in Mongolian, holds the roof poles and leaves an opening at the top of the yurt for light and for the smoke from the stove or fire. In traditional culture the crown carries special meaning and is often passed down through generations.
The covering
The frame is wrapped in thick layers of felt made from sheep's wool, then covered with an outer layer of canvas or other cloth to shed rain. In summer, felt layers can be removed or the bottom edge rolled up for ventilation.
The door and the stove
A wooden door, often brightly painted, sits in an opening in the lattice. A stove or hearth in the center heats the yurt, with its chimney rising through the crown.
Why the Round Shape Works
The yurt's design is not just traditional; it is very efficient. A circle encloses the most floor area for the length of wall, which saves material and reduces heat loss. The rounded shape lets wind flow around the structure instead of pushing hard against a flat wall. The tension band and compression ring create a self-supporting frame without interior posts. And a single stove in the center warms the whole room evenly. These are the same reasons yurts remain practical today.
Life Inside a Traditional Yurt
In many traditions the interior of the yurt is carefully organized. The stove sits at the center, the space opposite the door is a place of honor, and different sides of the yurt are used for different activities and household items. Families sit, eat and sleep around the central hearth, and the crown above serves as a kind of sundial as light moves across the floor during the day. Even in a modern yurt, people find themselves naturally gathering in the center under the dome.
The Yurt Comes to North America
Interest in yurts grew in North America in the 1960s and 1970s, when builders and back-to-the-land homesteaders began experimenting with the design. One of the best-known pioneers was William Coperthwaite, who began building wooden yurts in the 1960s and lived for many years in Maine. Around the same time and in the decades that followed, builders started making yurts with modern architectural fabrics, insulation and wooden frames designed for North American weather. These fabric yurts kept the traditional lattice, roof and ring, but added features such as clear domes, real doors and windows and engineered fabrics.
The Modern Yurt
Today's yurt is a modern building with an ancient blueprint. A White Mountain Yurt, for example, uses a lattice of clear, vertical-grain Douglas Fir, solid rafters, a laminated wooden ring and a clear acrylic dome where the traditional crown would be. A galvanized aircraft cable does the job of the traditional tension band. Instead of felt, insulation kits fit between the frame and the outer cover, and instead of canvas, the roof and walls use durable polymer and coated fabrics. You can read about each component on our features page.
The uses have expanded, too. Modern yurts serve as full-time homes, guest houses, offices, art studios, yoga spaces, classrooms, ski area shelters and glamping rentals. Some of those uses are described on our Stay in a WMY page and in our customer testimonials.
What Has Stayed the Same
For all the new materials, the experience of a yurt is still much as it was on the steppe. The circle draws people together. The light from the crown moves across the floor through the day. The stove at the center makes the whole room warm. And the whole home can still be taken down and moved if life takes you somewhere new. That combination of simplicity, comfort and freedom is why so many people choose to live outside the box.
Conclusion
The yurt is a design that has been tested by generations of families in some of the harshest climates on earth, then refined with modern materials. When you raise a yurt today, you are joining a very long tradition. To see how that tradition looks in a modern New England yurt, explore our yurt models, browse the gallery or read the yurt FAQ.
Plan Your Yurt with White Mountain Yurts
Every White Mountain Yurt is hand-built in New Hampshire. Compare our 16' to 30' yurt models, see the standard and optional features, or price your yurt in the online calculators.