Teaching and Advocating for Natural Building through workshops, testing and practice

We believe that housing is a human right and that it can be climate-resilient and dignified for all.

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We teach, construct, and advocate for Natural Building practices, encouraging people to engage with our built environment. Natural Building is the art and practice of building structures with local natural materials. Natural building is not new, but it is revolutionary. We blend the practices gathered from traditions around the world, remembering that every one of us come from ancestors who built their own shelter with local materials, with modern day building practices. The common techniques we employ are cob, light straw clay, adobe, earthbag, and strawbale, using them to build houses, garden walls, wood fired earthen ovens, earthen plasters, and earthen floors.

  • Rocket Stove Cooker

    Join myself and Kirk (Donkey) Mobert for a 3 day deep dive into learning about Rocket Stoves. In this workshop we will be building a Rocket Cook Stove, the next addition to our wood fired kitchen.

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  • Build Outside the Box

    REGISTRATION CURRENTLY CLOSED- Stay tuned for the next round.

    This online course is taught by 16 Masterminds, builders, designers, scientists and teachers each who cover one type of building system.

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  • Earthen Walls - (Already passed)

    In this class we will use the same basic materials; clay, sand and fiber, to create a variety of different earthen building systems, including cob, adobe, Light straw clay, redwood bark clay, wattle and daub and earthen plasters.

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  • Natural Plaster (already passed)

    Join myself and Yoshi Makino for a 3 day deep dive into learning about natural plasters and finishes. From earthen base coats to fine finishes, we will cover a wide range of techniques.

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JOIN US FOR A WORKSHOP

We offer both in person and online workshops. When we started teaching online we thought it was going to be temporary, but we have come to love the accessibility it offers. What a privilege to offer support to people all over the world who can’t travel to join us in person, as well as parents that cant travel easily.

Earthen Shelter

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@earthenshelter

Last month I posted a step by step guide of how we constructed our most recent rocket mass heater to optimize efficiency and cooking surfaces. I’ll elaborate on the cooking surfaces here. In the first photo, I numbered the surfaces 1-5, hottes
Our Rocket Stove Cooker workshop has room for two more students. Join us next weekend as we build an earthen rocket stove cooker with Kirk “Donkey” Mobert @sundogbuilders , learning the principles of rocket stove technology and how to bu
We are excited to be hosting Kirk “Donkey” Mobert @sundogbuilders in less than 2 weeks, Oct. 3rd, 4th and 5th. He will be teaching a 3 day workshop on building a Rocket Stove to cook on. Over the years he has been incredibly generous wit
One more hands on work party this fall, with the focus on learning through doing. Sept. 26- 30 (or weekend option) In this Natural Building Camp we will be focusing on the base coat of earthen plaster and the mid layer of earthen floor, We aim to pr
Our rocket stove cooker workshop is two weeks away. Join us Oct 4-6 in Potter Valley, CA as we build an earthen rocket stove for cooking with one of the most experienced teachers, Kirk “Donkey” Mobert of @sundogbuilders There is so much
Earthen rocket stoves can be built in many different ways to serve different functions. Once you understand the principles, you can alter designs to fit your needs. Learning the guidelines that need to be followed allow us to build the cleanest, mo
Earthen plaster on the walls of a structure can completely change the look and feel of the space,  Whether the plaster is covering sheetrock walls or cob walls, made from earth you found on the side of the road or bought at a store, the softness
Yesterday I shared a post about our rocket stove hot tub. It does a great job heating the water, but we also built this solar water heater to preheat the water before the tub is filled. This style solar hot water heater is called a bread-box
We built this rocket stove heated bathtub for our house at @quail_springs during an apprentice program. It’s a simple upgrade from a standard wood fired hot tub that drastically improves the efficiency and burns far cleaner. What makes the ro
What is Earthen Plaster? We have a new blog post up that dives into the basics of earthen plaster with a few recipes included. Link to blog post in bio. If you want to a deeper dive, join is in 2 weeks for a 3 day workshop. (just a few spots left)