Earth, Wood and Sun – Natural Building, Local Style


“When we are able to successfully work with local ecologies to meet our needs, we do the Earth a better service. And we are becoming empowered in our own lives.”

Natural builder Chris Foraker gives a tour of work-in-progress at Aprovecho Center, Oregon. The structure’s clay, straw, sand, and wood come primarily from their own land. Much of the work was done by amateurs using techniques that don’t take industrial levels of technology. Aprovecho builders pioneered using small diameter flat-sided poles to replace dimensional lumber – a technique accepted into the local building code. Chris dreams of reintroducing “regional vernacular architectures.” This building beautifully expresses that dream.

YouTube

6 thoughts on “Earth, Wood and Sun – Natural Building, Local Style”

  1. OWEN, thank you so much for sharing this video.

    and for alerting folks to PEAK MOMENT TV.
    they have more than ten years of video episodes on their youtube channel.

    here is their website for those who would like to view more awesome interviews with folks making adifference in their local resilience .

    http://peakmoment.tv/category/videos/

    Reply
    • folks can ask their local libraries to order these videos as local resources for folks who do not go online. and those who do.

      Reply
      • Good point. Even moderate sized libraries carry quite a few good videos. It’s all about consumer demand. They will order a video if enough people request it.

        Reply
  2. Don’t miss the part about the small diameter flat-sided poles. That’s something most natural builders haven’t heard about.

    Reply

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