Heavenly Mud is a documentary about traditional architecture and magic in West Africa. The documentary celebrates traditional West African architecture, which uses mud (adobe) as its main material. The film will place it in the context of modern Western architecture and link it to the present movement towards our architectural roots embodied by organic architecture. The film was shot by Ton van der Lee and was broadcast by AVRO Television. It can be purchased here.
Building With Cob: A Step-by-step Guide
Cob building uses a simple mixture of clay subsoil, aggregate, straw, and water to create solid structural walls, built without shuttering or forms, on a stone plinth. This ancient practice has been used throughout Britain for centuries – in fact, the material is so strong and durable that it is currently in use for forty-five thousand houses in Cornwall, a county in southern England. Building With Cob: A Step-by-step Guide
Earth Construction in Korea
If only we could read Korean as this site seems to focus on traditional and experimental earth building techniques. You can translate the first page with babelfish but to navigate through the blog from the original page, scroll to the bottom and click the numbers. [ via ]
Rammed Earth in Fujian Province
Aerial view of Earth buildings located at Chuxi Village, Xiayang town, Yongding County, in east China’s Fujian Province in this picture taken December 10, 2004. There are about 30,000 earth buildings, dating mostly from the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties, in the Fujian Province, southern and eastern China.
I Love Cob
I Love Cob is a website that, in addition to professing it’s love for this building tehnique, includes photo galleries and related links.
Rammed Chalk: Pines Calyx
The Pines Calyx conference and training centre, an environmentally-friendly building made of chalk extracted from the White Cliffs, at St Margaret’s Bay in Kent, is said to be one of Europe’s “most sustainable and healthy” structures. [ photo set | press ]
House of 5 Dreams
House of 5 Dreams, by Jones Studio is a 30,000 square foot residence/private museum created to serve the needs of a pair of prolific art and artifact collectors. Knowing that much of their collection had been excavated, the decision was made to place exhibition space below the horizon and contained within 4-foot thick rammed earth walls. Above the gallery, a floating residential pavillion is spatially composed of translucent light.
Back to Earth: Adobe Building in Saudi Arabia
“The lavishly illustrated and well-written book records in great detail an inspirational project that is a major departure from those normally undertaken in Saudi Arabia, or for that matter the Arab world,” writes a review of William Facey’s seemingly rare Back to Earth: Adobe Building in Saudi Arabia
Tallest Earth Buildings
The four tallest earth buildings in the world are:
1. Al-Muhdhar Mosque, Tarim, Yemen – 53 meters (175 feet)
2. Huaca del Sol, Moche, Peru – 41 meters (135 feet)
3. Tower Houses, Shibam, Yemen – 29 meters (96 feet)
4. The Grand Mosque, Djenne, Mali – 11 meters (36 feet)
Vote for Earth
The Association La Voute Nubienne is involved in a fascinating project with friends in France and Burkina Faso in the construction of vaulted earth roofed houses. The Nubian vault is an ancient architectural technique, traditionally used in Sudan and central Asia, but until now unknown in West Africa, which can accelerate appropriate house-building in the Sahel. The technique uses basic, readily available, ecologically sound, local materials (earth, water, rocks…) and simple, easily learned procedures. The major cost element is labour, so cash stays in the local economy. In Burkina Faso, Mali, and Togo, trained VN builders are becoming independent entrepreneurs. Lots of photos, and a video, of AVN houses and other buildings (a church, a mosque, guest-houses…) can be see on their website.
Last month, they put in a bid to Ashoka (a global foundation promoting social entrepreneurship) for their Changemakers competition on “How to Provide Affordable Housing.”, and we have just been informed that we are amongst the 13 finalists shortlisted by a panel of five distinguished judges. Of these 13 finalists, 3 are to be chosen for the competition prizes by online voting, which must be done by October 16th. I’m writing to ask you whether you might spare a bit of time to have a look at this shortlist, and to vote for them (and for two other of the short-listed projects).
If they win one of the three prizes, the money will be used to finance the training of more AVN apprentices during the coming winter building season in Burkina Faso. And I can assure you that this is a very worthwhile, sustainable project : Nazira and I stayed in a VN guest-house in Boromo, Burkina Faso, last January, and can vouch for the quality and comfort of the buildings.
Each voter is required to cast votes for three of the projects – otherwise your vote is rendered invalid. (Ashoka say this is a good way of ensuring fair play, and has worked well in past competitions). The deadline for voting is October 16, 2006. The Changemakers Innovation Award winners will be announced on October 17, 2006.
This is where to go to see the short-list and to vote online : http://www.changemakers.net/journal/300606/