Strawbale Round House Showcases Every Natural Building Method Imaginable


Hassan’s round house– a structure still under construction– showcases just about every natural building technique you can imagine. His house is in the second year of building, but it’s future beauty is already visible even though it’s unfinished. This house implements many systems– heating, cooling, insulation, water– that make it a truly sustainable house.

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Unlimited Roundhouse Possibilities

There are many possible roundhouse designs
There are many possible roundhouse designs

I’ve often said roundhouses are the easiest, quickest way to build small houses. I did a quick search of roundhouses built with sustainable materials and was pretty amazed at all the possibilities. For instance, here’s a site with roundhouse photos.

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Joining Roundhouses and Other Shapes

Two roundhouses with connecting greenhouse
Two roundhouses with connecting greenhouse

I’m been saying for quite a while the easiest, fastest shape to build with earthbags is a roundhouse. Build one roundhouse and then add on later if you want to avoid debt. Adding a connecting space – two straight joining walls as shown above — is a simple solution for joining roundhouses. This simplifies roof construction since standard trusses can be used. Other options include reciprocal roofs, pole frame, etc. Using the connecting space as a greenhouse is ideal so you have at least some organic home-based food production nearly year-round.

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Three Roundhouses Design

This plan illustrates what I think is the simplest, easiest way to build an earthbag home: build in stages, one roundhouse at a time so you can pay with cash and move in right away. It’s far easier to start small and add on later than jump right into building a large home that could … Read more