For the past 15 years, Simone Swan has been on a crusade to promote adobe. Over the years, she established a foundation to teach construction techniques, built a demonstration house in Ojinaja and appealed to governments and lenders to fund housing programs for the poor.
Implements for Pisé or Rammed Earth Buildings
Regina’s Mud House
Mud is Up
In Australia the demand for mud bricks is rising.
Niche Market
The Wall Street Journal Guide to Property thinks that Modern Mud Homes
Are a Niche Market.
How to Build a Rammed Earth House
From Issue # 23 – September/October 1973 of the Mother Earth News, “How to Build a Rammed Earth House” written by John O. McMeekin: “Back in the 40’s I was considered an oddball. I wore a beard — revolutionary then — and I started, by myself, to build a house out of (of all things) rammed earth. People wondered about me. Today — as a V.P. and corporation director — I appear Establishment, and my home doesn’t look unusual either. It hugs a hilltop landscape, it’s surrounded by spacious lawns and sheltered by big oaks … and in the garage are two (count them, two) Mercedes. But my house is still made of rammed earth.
Ojinaga Mud Bricks
The pattern created by drying mud bricks, here in Ojinaga, Mexico, create a lanscape of building components that anticipate future processes. In the background is Simone Swan of the Adobe Alliance.
Adobes Drying In Peru
A field of adobes drying in Pisac, Peru.
Earth Building Maps
A map shows the areas on the planet where raw earth is used as a building material. The inset map on the lower left is France. More Earth Building Maps can be found at www.terracruda.com
Rammed Earth in Sentinel Plaza, Tucson
Sentinel Plaza is an outdoor gathering place near Santa Cruz Linear Park whose dominant features are four rammed-earth monoliths that face Sentinel Peak.