Oct. 11-15
$500 for 5 days if register after Oct. 1st. $400 early registration. Includes 3 Meals a Day. Daily Yoga and Meditation, and Natural Building Classes. Located in Paradise CA.
2016 Natural Building Season
Natural Building Workshop: Cob Building, Natural Plastering, Earthen Flooring
Natural Living Skills
Expand your natural building skills, learn cob-building and build a cob bench, create an earthen floor, make your own natural plasters and practice artfully applying to finish a beautiful natural cob meditation chapel. Come for the weekend or stay for the full workshop for more hands-on experience. Just 25 miles southwest of Portland, Oregon. Enjoy the quiet and beautiful pastoral setting and get a taste of community life. Camping, daily yoga classes and delicious vegetarian meals included.
Hands on Natural Building Experience
Hands on practice with several finishing processes on a recently built cob structure. The workshop includes working with exterior natural earthen plasters for preservation and artistic expression, install an earthen floor and build a cob bench. You will work with different earthen mixes using sand, clay soil natural oils and pigments that preserve and bring luster to wall finishes. Get a taste of all the techniques in the weekend workshop or gain more hands-on experience and finish the project in the full 6-day workshop.
Beautiful Natural Setting outside Portland, Oregon
The workshop will take place at Ananda Center at Laurelwood, a yoga and retreat center, 40 minutes from downtown Portland. Daily guided meditation and yoga included. Registration is limited to allow personalized hands on instruction. The building site is set on a lovely hillside with views of the coastal range and spectacular sunsets, starry night displays and a fun camp fire circle guaranteed! Enjoy the feeling of deep friendship that comes from building and working together and the family environment of our center with residents, interns and guests.
Instructor Pablo Loayza from Natural Living School
Pablo Loayza comes to us from Natural Living School, located in the foothills of the Sierras at the Ananda Village in Nevada City, CA. At Natural Living School, students learn to construct affordable, naturally built cottages and structures, gain experience and confidence to simplify their lives and create the potential for self-sufficiency. The Natural Living School is also a full service natural build and design company. Pablo apprenticed with Cob Cottage Company in 2010 and has been teaching and creating natural buildings ever since. Check out the Natural Living School site to see some of his latest projects!
Facilitator: John Gorman
Check out the Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/AnandaGreenBuilders and if you have questions about the workshop, contact at (503) 516-7789
The Benefits and Beauty of Natural Building:
Building with earth encourages one to fully reevaluate how a living space should feel. Our eyes are opened to the beauty of a wall covered with clay plaster, alive with subtle variations of texture, color, and light. Cob and straw-bale walls impart solidity and shelter in a profound way. Structures and surfaces built by hand convey that they were built by people, for people, thus creating a nurturing experience for the sheltered. In contrast, modern industrial materials and design hide the humanity of the creator and frequently expose inhabitants to toxins. Until we are experience an alternative to sterile flat walls covered in plastic paints, we don’t really know what we are missing.
-See more at: http://anandalaurelwood.org/program/cob/#sthash.ueTqXIPU.dpuf
Laying out the Building Lines For Your Natural Building
Site Preparation
After you select your site, and have a plan and design for your building, then you are ready for site preparation. The first thing to do is make sure you clear the site where the building will be located. This means removal of trees, shrubs, large rocks, stumps, or anything that may be in the way of the construction. If there is a lot of plant life, you may choose to transplant it, or if it’s just grasses you may just mow it down or weed whack it. If you are planning on having a living roof, you could use the top soil and the plants on your roof, as long as they don’t require lots of space for deep roots.
Laying Out The Building Lines
For the purpose of keeping things simple, lets look at two options. A round structure and and rectangular structure.
For a round structure; First, pound a stake deep in the ground where you want the center of your building to be. Make suer it’s deep enough that it won’t move easily if it gets hit on accident. Then, nail or screw a string on the stake that is the length of the radius of your building. Pull the string tight and walk around the building marking the circumference of the building with sticks or marking paint.
Then remove the top soil and set aside for future use. At this point repeat the above process to get the circumference of your inside wall. Make sure to use the same central stake. Try not to remove the stake until the foundation has been completed. You may want to leave it until the roof is done, so that you know where the center of the roof should be. If you are leaving your stake in for the duration of the building construction, make sure to build a cover for it, so it doesn’t get knocked around.
For the thickness of your inside wall, measure the size of your straw bales first. Next, add the thickness of your cob, scratch coat plastering, and finish plastering. For the cob class room, we made the foundation 18 inches wide, because we used 12″ bales (half bales), and added 2 inches of cob on the inside and outside walls, plus 1 inch for plastering.
For a Rectangular Buildings; First you need to make sure that your building lines are squared. The best way to do this is to start out by setting up some Batter Boards. These are usually made from 2×4 stakes and 1×6 ledgers that get screwed between the stakes. Locate the batter boards 4 feet or more away from the building lines. In most cases you want to make sure your batter boards have enough room for you to move your lines while you try to square the building. So, place your stakes at least 4 feet apart from each other and use batter boards that are at least 5 feet long.
The other important thing to remember is that you can also use the batter boards to help you level the tops of your stem wall. So build all the batter boards at the same height as you want your stem wall to be. Since we don’t have a transit or a laser level we used a water level to make sure all of our batter boards where at the same height.
Water levels are easy to use and inexpensive to buy. All you need is a clear tube at any diameter that is long enough to reach all your batter boards. The reason water levels work is because water always finds its own level. You can test it yourself, fill the tube with water making sure there is at least 6 inches of space at each end. Set the two ends next to each other and move one of them up then watch the water level clime on the other end. It works like magic.
Squaring Your Building Lines; Locate the four corners of your building, using a measuring tape or line, to make sure the corners are spaced out exactly the distance specified in the drawings. Use temporary stakes and don’t hammer them too deep. Start with one corner as your permanent stake. We usually start with the northeast corner, but you can start with any corner that makes sense to your site. The other three corners can be moved or adjusted to help make the building square. Using your permanent stake as your bench mark, pick the next stake to make permanent. In our case we choose the northwest corner, to make sure we have a true south facing building. If the site allows, use a compass to help you locate the northwest corner. Now that you have a straight line, the next step is to make sure the 3rd stake is at 90 degrees from your permanent stake. To do this we use the pythagorean theorem.
The pythagorean theorem is something we learned in school, you may remember it.
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If you don’t have a calculator handy, and the distances are not easy to square, then you can use the “3” “4” “5” rule. First you need to find a common unit. For example say your building was 12 feet long on side A, and 24 feet on side B, the common denominator is 6, because 3×6 =12 and 4×6=24, which mean that 5×6=30 which should be the distance of side C. Check it, see if I’m right.
For our building we wanted side A to be 12 feet, and our side B to be 17 feet. No common denominator there, so we used the pythagorean theorem.
Once you know what the distance of line “C” is (or your diagonal line), then you can move your third stake to make sure both distance “A” and distance “B” are still right, and that your diagonal line (line “C”) is also right. In our case we knew that the north line (which was our B line), was correct and all we needed to do was find our C line and make sure that the distance was 12 feet.
Then you repeat the process on the other side and get your building lines squared. check your diagonal lines to make sure they are both the same.
Once I have my corners set on the ground, then I build my batter boards. Others use the batter board to find their corner stakes. Try it both ways, and see what works best for you.
Now that you have your building lines, mark it with marking paint or sticks and remove the top soil from your building site and set it aside for later use. At this point you can mark your inside walls using the same processed mentioned above, or use the batter boards to mark them. Again make sure your wall thickness is correct before you move on to the next step. You don’t want to dig out your foundation trench the wrong size, and have to do it again.
In our case, we knew that we where going to use 12″ straw bales, (half bales) and 1″ cob plaster on the inside and out side. Plus we wanted to have some extra room in case we wanted to make a thicker plaster coat. So we went 16″ wide for our wall thickness.
Now on to the next step, the rubble trench foundation…..
A Student’s Perspective
I remember I arrived to school after a warm three-month summer off. Not expecting anything extraordinary, I met Pablo and three students at the door of the cob building ready for a day of easy work.
I mean what should I have expected. I have never worked with mud and straw. And here were a bunch of people building something with it.
I wasn’t very enthusiastic to work with a part of the earth that makes you look like a child playing in the mud, but I had an urge to see what the buzz was going around about natural building. So I put on my dirtiest clothes and jumped in with rocks in one hand and mud in the other.
After a couple hours, the buzz of natural building got me a little intoxicated—I was finally understanding the benefits of building with the earth. Yes, at first I was hesitant of even putting my hands on a cob house, but that was because I was afraid of getting my feet wet—literally and metaphorically.
As I gained the courage to dive in, a fascination and curiosity arose in my mind— I had as many questions as there are stars in the sky—and the people I worked with left an answer for every one. As my relationship with the cob building deepened, so did my friendships with fellow students. While working we laughed, learned and made mistakes as a team; there was not a moment where I thought I had too much responsibility or not enough. We started as a team of students and ended as a team of students.
I didn’t think I would value any of the moments I had playing with cob, but I will say I was completely wrong. I learned more than I imagined. I learned about nature and the way to be a part of it rather than fight with it. I learned sustainable living.
I am glad that I was part of such a project. I am certain that future students will laugh and learn from natural living too.
Best wishes to all who are interested,
Bardia Behmard
Natural Living School Student
Fall 2011
My Intro to Cob
My introduction to cob, and natural building came in the winter of 2010, when my wife brought home the “The Hand Sculpted House” book, written by Ianto Evans, Michael Smith and Linda Smiley. She had been interested in finding an alternative to our busy city life. I worked for myself 50 to 60 hours per week, and we had very little quality time together.
The book talks about building homes out of mud, straw, and sand, which admittedly sounded very foreign to me. I had experience in construction, restoring old portland homes, but at that time I was running a non-profit business helping the Hispanic community out of foreclosure. I was too busy to give the book a second look, but my wife was convinced that natural building might help us bring more balance to our lives.
So she went online, and found out that the Cob Cottage Company was in Oregon, not too far from Portland, where we lived. She also saw that they were going to have a work party. She called and spoke with Linda Smiley, and we were invited to join the work party. I was hesitant, but I agreed to go.
When we showed up, we found the location to be in the middle of the Oregon rain forest. We arrived in the evening, so we couldn’t really experience the beauty, but the energy was surely felt. As we walked up the trail, we saw a sign on the ground between two paths. The sign read, “There are two ways to get rich, you can make more money, or you can require less.”
We had already tried making more money, but what did it mean to require less? We continued up the path to a beautiful building that had a living roof. It looked like a hobbit house. As we got closer, I realized how beautiful the building looked. We walked in, and there were at least 15 people comfortably squeezed in the 10×20 ft space. They all looked so happy, talking, eating, and laughing.
At that moment I knew that this place was special, and yes the buildings were foreign to me, but at the same time there was something very familiar. That weekend we spent time adding moss to the natural roofs, making a cat cob bench, playing with natural plasters, and enjoying the beautiful Oregon rainforest.
After that weekend, my wife and I knew that this could be the answer we had been looking for. Affordable housing, living closer to nature, and having quality time doing work that feeds our spirit.
We went back home, energized to find a way to leave the rat race, and move out into the country and build our own cob cottage. Of course this was just a dream at the time, but little did we know how our life would change in the next couple years, all because of this one weekend. Come and join us during our work parties, and see if your life will change for the better.
Thank you Adam Komosinski for some of these pictures. My hard drive crashed and I lost many of my cob cottage pictures. You can see Adams blog post here.
What is Natural Living?
In a way, one of the most basic understandings in eastern philosophies has been lost in the “Age of Energy.” As a result of all our technology, we spend more time on cell phones, the internet, watching TV, and in cars running around like high tech chickens with our heads cut off. The art of slowing down, taking time to enjoy the moment, and being present is pushed aside in the name of efficiency. Why? One answer is; because we think this will lead to our happiness.
Some of us think that if we are more efficient with our time, then we will have more time to do the things we enjoy. But at the end of the day, with all the time that was saved, how many of us actually did something joyful, or self-fulfilling? Yes, there are some exceptions, but over all many of us think that our joy will come from outside ourselves. I used to think that I would find joy once I had a little more money, which would give me a little more time. Not so.
Our experiences these past couple years have truly shown us what it means to have quality time. For months at a time we were without cell phone, internet, television, or any basic communication with the outside world. Our time was spent in nature, sourcing natural materials from the land, the forest, and neighbors in order to build natural buildings that would be enjoyed by all.
When we were not building, or sourcing materials, we spent our time in community taking turns cooking for each other, having great conversations, and playing with our children. It wasn’t that we weren’t busy, or that we had surplus time. In fact we were easily as busy as when we lived in the city, working all the time, driving the kids around, and doing endless errands. The difference was that we were busy doing something that was fulfilling to our spirits.
The idea of simple living doesn’t mean to give up all your possessions and move to the country, or to the wilderness, it simply means to evaluate your time and expenses so that you’re doing something that feeds your soul. It helps to lower your expenses, to grow some of your own food, and to have a low housing cost, but it’s not a requirement to be poor. Some of the happiest people I know in South America are looked upon as poor, but in my eyes, they are rich in spirit, love, and joy. They were always willing to share what little they had, with joyful abundance.
Thank you Betty, Tatacho, Levi and all the friends we made at Spirit Pine Sanctuary. It was wonderful working, living, and playing with you all.
The Natural Living School
In this day and age, where the answer to many questions are just a click away, people are still having a hard time answering the age old question, “why do I feel so unhappy?” Most of us, who have tried to answer this question, have come up with several logical answers.
“More money,” if I had more money than I would be happy.
“Better job,” if I had a job I liked, or if I had a job that paid more, then I would be happy.
“More time,” if I had more time to do what I wanted, then I would be happy.
The list can go on, and on, but these are some of the most common answers. At the Cob Cottage Company, as you walk up the trail to the main building, there is a sign that says, “There are two ways to get rich, you can make more money or you can require less.” The truth to us is in the second statement, “to require less.”
The Natural Living School is a place where people can come to explore how to live simply and require less, to gain experience so they can construct natural buildings that are affordable for themselves and their families, to learn how to grow their own food so they can lower their food costs, and to gain the confidence to change their lives forever.
The Natural Living School is an organization, focused on examining and co-creating new and old methods of sustainable living and natural building. Come and study with us, the art of natural living and higher thinking.
Natural Living School 