‘Because of it’s great thermal properties and its wide abundance, earth as a modernbuilding material could become a major sustainable solution for the housing market.’
If used correctly, mud and earth on buildings can create beautiful architectural things that can stand for hundreds of years. (see some good evidence here). So mud as a building material is eco-friendly and cheap. But in climates which are wet like in Wales, far from the arid deserts of Peru, Can you still build with mud?
The above comes courtesy of the Ecovillages video series – an obsession with community and low impact living that began in Gower, Wales, and has covered eco-pioneers in Australia, Spain, Scotland and Ireland. They normally show the people growing their own food, building their own homes and learning to be self sufficient so come and join us.
In this episode, heavy autumn rains have made progress difficult for the mud ecovillage pioneers in Pembrokeshire, Wales, but they have still built two beautiful reciprocal frame roundhouses.
What are Reciprocal Frames?
The term ‘reciprocal frame’ was coined by Graham Brown of Findhorn in about 1987, so it hasn’t been around for very long but the idea has been around for ages – Leonardo da Vinci designed a floor using reciframes where none of the floor joists was as wide as the floor itself.
In Japan there are many ingenious structures using the principle, and those Morris dancers among us will remember the Sword dance where six swords are held out into the centre of a circle by the dancers and placed one on the other until they are locked together. The flash young handsome dancer (there’s usually one) then leaps up onto the sword reciframe in the centre and is supported at shoulder height by the rest to the accompaniment of wild cheers and windblown scots bagpipe music. Yes children, try this at home. The first reciframes I heard of in Britain were the whisky barrel houses at Findhorn community, and Jack Everett’s dojo near Stroud. Once grasped, the idea of a reciframe is very easy to make your own, and it is spreading very fast as people learn how easy they are to make, how efficient and strong they are, and how great they look from underneath (and above, until you put the roof on).
