Earth Gazer

In Missouri, USA, there's a place called 'Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage'. If the name isn't beautiful enough, some of the natural buildings being constructed there will win you over! I've been following the exploits of a guy called Ziggy for quite a few years - he initially built a cob roundhouse with reciprocal frame roof (a lá Tony Wrench of www.thatroundhouse.info ) and although it looked beautiful, Ziggy was open and honest about the failings of the building - mainly that pure cob was simply not insulating enough in the cold and damp winters they experience there, and consequently, it became very hard to heat. Anyway, with the experience of that first building, he and his partner and friends went on to design and build a timber framed and strawbale house called the 'Strawtron' which is now completed and for sale. The overall design and quality of finish, particularly the fine plasterwork is awe inspiring. I'll let some of the pictures do the talkin...

One of my loves is 'natural building', and of the techniques/methods around, the 2 key ones are Strawbale and Cob. Cob is literally clay (from the ground), sand and chopped straw. Millions of houses around the world are actually made from earth in one form or another, but the technique of cob building is vernacular to many parts of the UK. In Devon, even today, you can still find many buildings that have been standing for hundreds of years, made from local cob. The advantages of cob is that it is usually local (often dug up from a few feet away), simple to make, highly sculptural and provides a lot of thermal mass. The downside is that construction can be slow (unless there's a large group of helpers!), and cob itself does not provide much in the way of insulation. Anyway, pros and cons aside, cob buildings can be some of the most beautiful structures around. Hat-tip to Steven Golemboski-Byrne who had a link to this building in Somerset on his blog . For more infor...