we need to take responsibility for our lives. We don’t have to wait for the larger society to solve our many environmental problems. Many solutions come from the ground up and building with earth is exactly that. Don’t wait for calamity to embrace change, change now! IT is empowering and liberating.
Earth Building
Earth building is a revolution. Lets live, breath, and eat from the earth.
Use your Hands and Feet to build a building!
Earth building is a natural and simple way to build. Cob is basically earth, clay, sand, and straw. Much of old Europe is made from this style. It is very long lasting, cheep and thermal. It is also very low tech so anyone can build. It is good for creative non liner thinking types. Instead of strait and angular it lends itself to round and lumpy. Cob is also heavy so strength or friends is helpful.
Buckets
You will need many buckets, a drill and a tarp. Start by gathering materials. Clay and sand are the things you may have to search out. Soak your clay and get it into a slip consistency.
Add clay to dirt
Use your feet!
There is nothing so simple as a foot mash. Use your feet to mix the cob.
Straw is the fiber binder
Mix the straw in last. Mash it with your feet and then your cob is done.
You can decorate
Bottles make great luminous decorations for cob buildings. You can make anything happen your earthen building...arches, round windows, dragons... use your imagination.
Wood, glass, and earth
Mixing mediums is so beautiful. Use wood for edges and framing, glass for light and fill in the rest with earth.
Messy but good.
This is a sweat lodge. It is a small building. It took several cobing parties to complete.
Mixing the elements
Add your regular ol dirt to sand on the tarp and then mix in the clay slip. Use your feet to mash together. When moist and thick place up on wall and mash down as hard as you can. Building a structure is much like a coil pot. you put layer upon layer until you have a wall.
Earth building is beautiful, efficient, and cheep.
A very feminine building method, it can be done with friends, it doesn’t require a lot of measuring but more feeling and molding, and there is a lot of room for creativity.
Poor clay soil makes the best building material
The more clay in the soil the better. A very forgiving building material, it can be a mix of organic material, sand, and clay. Only fine garden soil is bad for building. So grow food in the garden soil and build with the other soil. It is a sustainable life style.
Simple tools and your own body can build a house.
You don’t need much besides a drill, wheel barrow, buckets, pitchfork, shovel, and your own feet and hands.
Solid and easily repaired.
With a R value of about 2 per inch, straw and clay building is moderately warm but it also has a heat sink effect where heat is stored within the dense structure, so when it is warmed up it stays warm.
It is gratifying to live in organic structures.
They are not only easy to build, cheep, and beautiful, they are also a sustainable. Many of the oldest villages in Europe are made of clay-straw cob. They have been standing and repaired for generations.