earthen acres: Danielle is building a very small cob cottage and documenting her progress. So far her home has a completed dry-stacked (and beautiful!) urbanite foundation with the first layers of cob on the wall. I am excited to see how this little structure gets on.

mud for everyone: I haven’t ventured very far into Erica Ann’s blog, but damn if that cob loop-de-loop isn’t cool! Check out the June 1 post.

clay sand straw blog: I’ve enjoyed perusing these folks’ website and the wealth of photos of their building projects, so I anticipate future updates on this new blog.

Any others you would like to share? Comment and lemme know.

I was very fortunate to recently catch wind of Carpenters from Europe and Beyond, an incredibly valuable traditional carpentry resource from France’s Ministry of Culture. The website is host to a wealth of information about the history of carpentry, the people who honed the craft, and videos of modern day traditional carpenters continuing to work by hand, especially in the timber framing tradition.

Included are profiles of some historical and modern day carpenters, a wealth of information about the classic toolbox of a carpenter working by hand, and several dozen videos with carpenters demonstrating their skill. (Not to be missed is the Japanese master carpenter squaring off a log — barefoot!)

Awesome.

This website came to me at a good time, since I and my sub-community here at Dancing Rabbit plan to build our kitchen mostly by hand, using some of these same techniques. The frame will be roundwood post and beam, assembled by hand as much as possible. I personally have little experience working with wood, but this website has given me a good background on some of the history.

The Hand-Sculpted House
By Cob Cottage Company

This is the number one go-to book for cob building. It’s building philosophy, history, how-to, troubleshooting, and everything in-between. Written by the founders of the Cob Cottage Company, the book takes readers through the design process, digging a foundation trench, building walls, roofs, and pretty much all you need to know to build your own cob house. If you have this book, you’re going to be armed with most of the book knowledge you need to get started. Best of all, the writing is hugely inspiring, too!

Building a Low Impact Roundhouse
By Tony Wrench

Tony Wrench details the entire process of building his own hybrid roundhouse (with cordwood, cob, etc.) in Wales in this resourceful guide. Most important to me was the book’s detailed instructions on how to build a reciprocal roof – the only printed documentation anywhere! Worth the price of admission alone. Tony Wrench is a resourceful builder with a fine writing style, and the book includes plenty of photos and drawings. Unfortunately, the book is a little difficult to find outside of the UK. (I got mine here.)

Rocket Mass Heaters: Superefficient Woodstoves You Can Build (And Snuggle Up To)
By Ianto Evans, Leslie Jackson

This is pretty much the only book that documents how to build a rocket stove from start to finish, with a materials guide, proportions and dimensions drawings, and step by step instructions. I was a little frustrated that crucial construction details (and images) are absent in the book, but if you want to build a rocket stove, you’re going to want this book.

And strictly for inspiration… because photos and stories are priceless…

Shelter, Home Work, Builders of the Pacific Northwest
(All written by Lloyd Kahn)

Shelter Publications, home to Lloyd Kahn (author of the titles above), has put out these three incredible books chock full of amazing owner-built and vernacular homes across the globe. Great homes, great photos, and Lloyd’s storytelling style just seals the deal. These books are hugely inspirational.

Built By Hand
By Eiko Komatsu, with photos by Yoshio Komatsu

Again… another massive and greatly inspirational book documenting a huge range of traditional buildings across the planet. Every page features beautiful photos by building photographer extraordinaire, Yoshio Komatsu. The quality of the photos, and the number of them, is great. A fantastic book for browsing.

Are you a natural building professional who is tired of:

• Living in an off the grid ecovillage where you do your building work
• Building houses for rent or for sale to help support the growth of an amazing community
• Building the house of your dreams without worrying about code constraints
• Being connected with friends around you who share your values, and support your work in the world

Contact me now to learn more!

I live at Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage and I’m inviting you to come check out our community to see if it is a good fit for you to achieve your building dreams.

Here’s how you can find out more about visiting our community to see if it is a good fit for you.

Nathan

P.S. Our visitor season is only open during the building season, which I know might not work well for you, but…

I’m willing to personally host you as my guest during the building off season.

So, if you can’t visit during the building season, the sooner your contact me, the easier it will be for me to plan to host you.

You can help spread awareness about cob building by helping The Year of Mud to continue to share cob building stories and information.

Cob building is a time-tested, sustainable natural building technique that can thrive in these times of increasing unease about the future. Cob houses can help promote a lower impact lifestyle and increased ecological awareness, and contribute to local community and culture.

Help The Year of Mud demonstrate sustainable building techniques and simple living by supporting this website’s efforts to share continuing examples of natural building.

Many have already been inspired, and many more can be motivated by examples of cob building:

Your blog is great! Of course, it’s making me incredibly impatient to get started on my own cob adventure. Thank you so much for sharing all of your experiences! – Robin

Can’t wait for more. I found this blog today and have just completed reading it. Whew! Thank you for the extreme detail. Very enjoyable. – Matt

You are living my dream! I have been wanting to build a cob house for five years, but one thing or another has always held me back. But reading your blog has been almost like doing it myself. – Knobbly

Your donation will help promote cob building and support The Year of Mud to continue to share cob building stories, how-to tutorials, documentation, and photos for my first cob house and future natural building projects.

Please take a moment now to support The Year of Mud in promoting and inspiring cob building methods and techniques. Your donation will go towards maintaining The Year of Mud website and future cob building projects.

No matter the amount, every contribution helps!

Yours truly,

Ziggy

You can also contribute by sending a check to:

Ziggy’s The Year of Mud
1 Dancing Rabbit Lane
Rutledge, MO 63563
USA

Thank you!

Thanks for reading!

Check out this post I wrote about building with reclaimed lumber and recycled materials. Much of the work in getting free building supplies is talking to the right people.

Check out the full article here: Natural Building 101: How to build an earthen or adobe floor.

If you’re interested, check out the full article here: The Reciprocal Roof: Beauty, Strength, and Simplicity in a Roof Frame

(P.S. That’s Liat on my roof!)

This is a sort of introduction to cob building for anyone unfamiliar with the technique. Please check it out!