New Earthbag Houses in Bangnol, Haiti

From Patti Stouter: The cardiologist with the Haiti Christian Development Project who helped get the Bois Marchand earthbag house built near Gonaives, Haiti sent a link to some photos- 2 are the new earthbag buildings at a small village called Bognol. I helped to design the site and these buildings. Earthbag houses bring great excitement … Read more

Raschel Mesh for Narrow Walls

Patti Stouter sent me this news about raschel mesh from a supplier in Canada that works perfectly for the narrow rubble walls in her Totally Tubular design. She builds hyper-wattle — tubes of lightweight insulation — on top of the narrow rubble walls. “The 18″ wide raschel got here last night and I tried it … Read more

Hyper-Wattle on Rubble Bags

Here’s Patti Stouter’s entry for the $300 House design competition. Rubble bags on lower walls provide a solid, flood resistant wall. Hyper-wattle provides lightweight insulating upper walls made of mesh tubes. Thin walls conserve space and materials, and take less labor. Her design is one of only a few in this competition that could actually … Read more

East Coast Earthbag Workshops

This is very good news for those who live on the east coast. Patti Stouter, now one of the knowledgeable leaders in earthbag, is offering $50 one day courses in New York. She’s been an enormous help on projects in Haiti and on my book, and has my full support. The text below is from … Read more

Friction and Tensile Strength of EB Components

Patti Stouter has published another earthbag technical report. It is a summary of the state of testing to date, and also covers some of the codes related to earthbag. The following information is quoted from this report. According to the new international earthen building standards, if earthbag walls with some reinforcing have shear strength equal … Read more