Building with Straw Bales
There are so many interesting forms of "alternative construction". Each has its own look, its own required set of skills and materials, and its own list of pro's and con's. Building with straw is what we are becoming familiar with as we are now finishing up our third and fourth outbuildings while making plans for a fifth building with matching straw bale wall.
Building with straw is fun. Straw itself is a resource that can renew itself within one growing season. It is safe to work with and is usually available from a number of places within any community. Straw bale construction, in its simpler forms, is low-tech enough to be suitable for families to work together with it. This is one of the big reasons we chose straw bale construction and are continuing to use it. Our children are growing up knowing through experience that they can build useful buildings. We think this is very important. We also find that working every day in and around outbuildings that we have constructed together as a family is very unifying. It creates a deep sense of shared history and lends richness to every day tasks.
A House of Straw - This is the web site of a single mother of two teenage boys who built a beautiful load-bearing straw bale house. The web site is gorgeous just as their house is. There are photos, lists of expenses incurred and details about the process they went through. She has written a book documenting the whole project which you can also read about on the web site. Inspiring.
Building with Awareness - "Green Building, Good Design - Simply Explained" - This web site has resources for designing and constructing straw bale solar hybrid homes. An elegant site with a very useful array of information.
Crestone Solar School - This school located in beautiful and innovative Crestone, CO gives workshops during the summer on "Solar Heating and Natural Building Design." They are conducted by Paul Shippee who is an award-winning, internationally known, solar design engineer/builder. Special focus is on adapting his solar designs to straw bale construction. The Resources page is worth a visit in and of itself with articles and links and e-books.
Dirt Cheap Builder - An enormous catalog of books, articles and video's/ CD's geared towards building low cost, natural homes. Info about straw bale construction as well as just about everything else related to alternative construction including both applications for inside such as earth plasters and radiant heat.
Dream Green Home Plans - This site is a treasure trove of information and inspiration. Find plans for building in conventional styles, straw bale, timber, Earthship, cord wood, organic, earth, stone, domes and lightweight concrete. Find plans for everything from homes to dog houses to cold storage.
Geiger Research Institute of Sustainable Building - Promoting Natural Building, and sustainable design and development, through research, training, education, and consulting services - Go here to find downloadable house plans, certification and training programs for building with straw bale, downloadable (i.e. free) publications mostly related to straw bale construction, and links to inspiring photographs of straw bale and other alternatively constructed homes.
House of Straw - Straw Bale Construction Comes of Age - This comes from the US Dept. of Energy, Building Technologies Program. Even though the document is a bit old (April 1995), it contains a detailed history of straw bale construction, reviews methods, charts research results and building costs and includes suggestions for purchasing straw bales.
Plastered Straw Bale Construction: A Waste to a Resource - In addition to some technical explanation of straw bale construction, this article also points out the importance of finding a sustainable use for the straw that would otherwise be considered a waste material.
Red Feather Development Group - This highly respected nonprofit organization focuses on relieving the severe housing shortage among American Indians. Volunteers gather with American Indian families to build homes together. Their preferred style of building is with straw bales. Red Feather sells two highly praised books about straw bale construction covering both its social importance as well as methods of building.
Sourcebook Straw Bale - This site contains a registry of straw bale buildings you can visit, links to resources for builders, tools for finding straw and straw bale listserv's.
Strawbale Building - This is a reprint from a magazine which provides a brief overview of the benefits and ease of straw bale building. It is written by Steen, Steen and Bainbridge - names long associated with this form of construction.
Straw Bale Home Construction - El Paso Solar Energy Association- This page has a brief overview of the benefits of straw bale home construction along with a number of interesting links at the bottom of the page. The site contains pages of other solar information to take into account like energy efficiency tips, thermal mass, solar cooking and drying and so on.
Strawbale House Construction - Find here Thomas Elpel's overview of straw bale home construction as well as an annotated bibliography of straw bale construction books available for sale individually or as a package. Mr. Elpel is author of The Living Home, among other titles.
Straw Bale Construction, A Sustainable Alternative - This is a simple, one page explanation of straw bale home construction.
Straw Bale Needle - This builder designed and sells a very useful straw bale needle used to sew straw bales together and sew mesh to the straw bales. Along with the needles come an e-book and DVD so that you can see how to use this tool the most effectively.
Surfin' StrawBale - A huge, wonderful annotated list of links for all manner of things "straw bale".
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Blogs About Building Straw Bale Homes
The Straw House Blog - A Canadian family builds an off the grid, post and beam straw bale house. Not updated very frequently but kept up as a resource.
Stonehouse Straw House - "Our Straw Bale Home Building Experience" - This house is also being build in Canada. Nice current blog and beautiful house.
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