Pallet Roofs

I found another great way to build gable and vaulted roofs — with pallets: Pallet Pavilions The site referenced above shows how pallets can be used for walls and roofs. This is exciting because free pallets are usually quite easy to get in most countries and they’re very strong. Many are made of hardwood such … Read more

Earthbag Roundhouse Workshop

Date: 7 days, April 19-25, 2010 Cost: $500 includes excellent hotel, shuttle van, breakfasts, dinners, snacks Location: Sakon Nakhon, Northeast Thailand Instructor: Owen Geiger Email: strawhouses [@] yahoo dot com Roundhouse information: Round earthbag office, 15’ interior diameter, 18” walls, earthbag foundation Wood doors and windows, small bathroom, earthbag benches 16 sided wood bond beam, … Read more

Dirt Cheap Housing Advice

Here’s an email from one of our readers (abbreviated for ease of reading). I just had a few questions about building an earthbag home, and I hope you can get me pointed in the right direction. First off, I’m broke, so these questions pertain to me saving up for my future home. My dream home … Read more

Low-cost Multipurpose Minibuilding Made With Earthbags

One of the most practical structures on a small farmstead is a multi-purpose garden structure that can serve as a storage shed or cool pantry above ground, or as a root cellar or storm shelter below ground. You can build this multipurpose structure for about $300 using earthbag construction (bags filled with earth and stacked … Read more

Earthbag Rootcellar

Here’s a real nice earthbag/ferrocement rootcellar plan from Karl in the Missouri Ozarks. It is 8’ across, has 2’ of soil on top and beautiful stonework in front. Great job Karl! Karl describes his rootcellar in more detail: The U-shape on the top of the bags is a row of cement beam block that will … Read more

Earthbag Cisterns

Since water is vital to life, and there is increasing scarcity of clean drinking water in much of the world, it makes sense to store this precious resource and use it wisely. Earthbags in combination with ferrocement offer a number of interesting alternatives for storing water. Three different methods are shown below. www.flickr.com/photos/10349013@N02/2798383930 www.flickr.com/photos/11222150@N02/1082496465 http://earthbagplans.wordpress.com/2009/06/24/earthbag-cistern/