Rammed Earth University Cottages
Wide-eyed and inquisitive, 25 first-year students moved into Charles Sturt Universitys residential rammed-earth cottages in Thurgoona, Australia. The Student Pavillion, which was the first new building, laid the foundation for demonstrating and gaining acceptance of an environmental design approach to the further development of the Thurgoona campus.
Clay – The Eternal Stuff Of Building
Mud is almost too basic to talk about, but humans have used it for more than 15,000 years to build things, so its value is inestimable. And, since most clay is free – there’s no commercial market (outside of artists’ specialty clays) competing for your dollars.
Texas Rammed Earth/South Carolina Origins
Southwest School of Art & Craft, with roots dating to 1848, when the Catholic community started building the Ursuline Academy, an elite, private girl’s school, it is one of the oldest education sites in San Antonio, Texas. It was recently declared the largest and most significant example of French-influenced architecture in the state by the French Heritage Society. Early buildings on the campus were designed by famed architect Francois Giraud, the city’s first surveyor who is responsible for many of the city’s distinct buildings, including the French Gothic style addition of San Fernando Cathedral. Giraud, who was born in South Carolina to French immigrant parents, chose a construction method called pise de terre, or rammed earth, for the buildings. Skilled pise worker Jules Poinsard worked as a subcontractor on the project.
Arup Engineers Mud Brick
Architecture Week reports that since 1997, engineers and architects from Arup and Arup Associates in London have been working with the Ladakhi Buddhist community, in Ladakh, India, and the United Kingdom-based charity, the Drupka Trust, to design and build a self-sustaining community using a combination of traditional and modern building methods and materials.
Laurie Baker
Laurie Baker’s architectural career began as a student at Birmingham University. However, his blossoming professional practice, only a year old, was cut short when World War II erupted in Europe. As a conscientious objector, Baker enlisted in the Friends’ Ambulance Unit and served as a medical technician in China and Burma. Read more in the essay, Of Mud and Men: Architecture as a Political Act
The Building Bookshop
The Earth Building section of the The Building Bookshop Architecture Bookstore has several interesting titles.
Yemen Article
This article from the Architectural Review describes how for over two millennia, the inhabitants of the Yemen have built their strange tower houses out of the earth below them. The tradition continues still and seems adaptable to modern life. Though much is beginning to decay, the crafts continue.
Sustainable House in Central Australia
The first of several houses to for the Arrillhjere Corporation on aboriginal land, 30 killometres west of Alice Springs. It’s a mud brick house, designed to be energy efficient and suitable an Aboriginal lifestyle in central Australia.