Building Styles – Page 143 – Natural Building Blog

Thermal Performance Data on an Earthbag Dome

June 3, 2022April 28, 2016 by Owen Geiger

Awhile ago, I wrote to you asking if you had any recommendations for stabilizing our 14′ (inner diameter) scoria dome tank house which had started to fail as a result of the bags breaking down. I wanted to give you an update.

Beldar
We paid a crew last November to shotcrete it inside and out, and it is performing very well. I just wish I knew whether it was the mass of concrete or the insulation of the bags. Probably a combo. I am interested to see how it performs once the mass has heated up a bit this summer.

Why We Need Handbuilt Homes

June 3, 2022April 24, 2016 by Owen Geiger

I got an email from Cari Corbet-Owen saying, “I recently completed producing a 2- part series on 1) why natural building is so imperative and 2) the challenges that stand in our way aka. building codes. I have posted them on youtube so that they are freely available and readily accessible. I’d love for them … Read more

The Eco-Home Design Guide

June 3, 2022February 2, 2016 by Owen Geiger

Christopher Day is a veteran of the world of architecture in Britain. In his new book, The Eco-Home Design Guide: Principles and practice for new-build and retrofit, he has condensed his considerable experience of both designing and hands-on building into a set of guiding principles for how to go about your own ecological building project.

The book is well organized into primary divisions that deal with the major issues that confront anyone who undertakes such a journey. These what, where, how and when issues are each examined in turn, so that by the time you complete the book, you should have a good understanding of all of the issues that need to be addressed. Each chapter is summarized at the end with a listing of the key points covered and a chart of the main choices that need to be made. With this approach, you can quickly thumb through the book to review the basic information presented.

Texas Stonehenge

June 3, 2022January 25, 2016 by Owen Geiger

Texas Stonehenge is what Clay DiMeno calls this bunker/tornado shelter/man cave that he made with earthbags and a lot of creative ingenuity. Most people would not realize that this roundhouse was actually made from earthbags, because of Clay’s faux stone rendering. This is similar to a root cellar that he made and we featured earlier.

Gabion Beams for Earthquake Resilience

June 3, 2022November 8, 2015 by Owen Geiger

I met Randolph Langenbach at the Natural Building Colloquium in New Mexico a few weeks ago, and was in the audience when this video was being recorded. Randolph has taken the original footage and enhanced it with many extra images, so that it is really better than it was the first time. I think the … Read more

Sunray Kelley’s Tree House

June 3, 2022October 29, 2015 by Owen Geiger

During one of the early morning circles Sunray Kelley pointed up the hill to a group of trees and explained that he would be building a tree house there and that people were welcome to join him in the project. It didn’t take him long to attract a group of helpers willing to go around scrounging structural elements for this.

Sunray is a well known character around previous colloquia and a famous artist/builder in his own right. He grew up in the woods of Washington State and still resides on the family property, where he gleans material for most of the building that he has done there. I have never seen him wear shoes.