Oaxaca

Plasters and Floors. Pisos y acabados.

2011-11-28T13:42:00.001-06:00

I have been working here on and off, for a few months. I am the master finisher. I am doing only the walls and floors.

Tadelakt Azul

2011-11-12T12:12:00.000-06:00

Cob Arch and Wall. Ferro-cement Car Entrance and 5 Wooden Doors!

2011-10-29T07:42:00.005-05:00

The wood was harvested and milled less than 10 miles from the job site.Thats me up there!

The restored adobe wall on the left and the existing cement home on the right are now connected through a gradual transition of a ferro cement arch, 1" thick.

"La Semillita". Community Market.

2011-10-15T16:39:00.000-05:00

I worked here from start to finish. I am the designer and builder. The adobe walls were a 100 year old barn and has been locally restored to serve the community once more.

New, But old roof

2011-09-15T16:28:00.000-05:00

Part of the organic market restoration in Oaxaca. The spanish tiles (Tejas) are from the old building and are over 100 years old!

Cordwood Timberframed Yurt

2011-08-30T16:31:00.002-05:00

Adobe reconstruction, Before and After

2011-08-03T17:11:00.001-05:00

Taller / workshop

2011-07-10T17:11:00.001-05:00

Living Roof

2011-06-05T17:31:00.000-05:00

HOME

2011-01-10T14:21:00.002-06:00

Yurt progress

2011-01-10T14:03:00.001-06:00

Cob Sandbox in Oaxaca

2010-10-12T11:50:00.004-05:00

The following 4 photos are of a Cob Sandbox I designed and built in a pre-school near downtown Oaxaca City.

Baked Adobe Dome

2010-06-16T07:58:00.003-05:00

Cob Home

2010-06-09T07:21:00.005-05:00

Our Home in Oaxaca

2010-05-06T08:37:00.016-05:00

Above: This will be our future home. The walls will be Cob or also called a "pile of mud". This pile of mud is an engineered mix of very strong straw, sand and local clay/dirt. The clay content is around 25% of wall volume. The rock wall is made from local rocks on the land and also "urbanite", which is recycled concrete.

May 21, 2010
Week 9 into Cobbing

the tire work, groundwork, foundation, urbanite and local rock stem wall, all took place over the last two years or so.

Cob home in San Pablo Etla. I designed and built.

2010-05-04T08:51:00.003-05:00

Cob home in San Pablo Etla

2010-05-04T08:50:00.000-05:00

Cob home in San Pablo Etla

2010-05-04T08:46:00.000-05:00

Cob home in San Pablo Etla

2010-05-04T08:44:00.001-05:00

Cob home in San Pablo Etla

2010-05-04T08:42:00.001-05:00

Tadelakt

2009-12-19T09:09:00.002-06:00

Below are two photos of yesterdays work. This finish is called

"Tadelakt" its an ancient Morrocan finish consisting of Lime and Marble.

Polished with river stones and hard steel. With a natural blue pigment

shallot sprouts!

2009-05-23T16:55:00.000-05:00

one week later after putting this yummy morsel in the dirt

cob house updates

2009-05-23T16:52:00.001-05:00

below: Main room is painted with an "alis" made from imported white clay, local mica, whole milk powder, wheat paste and water. you can see the stairs leading up to the sleeping loft. the stairs are walnut, a neighbor cut her tree down and was using it for firewood, so i bought a few pieces from here.

below: view into bathroom, door to come

below: Bathroom. paint is called an "alis". made from locally harvested pink clay, ground mica that is from our valley, wheat paste and water

Month of May, various photos

2009-05-23T16:47:00.002-05:00

below, ariel view from neighbors land

below: above brick house will be more house, we are building now

below: subsurface infiltrator of our laundry water, opened for inspection
working great after one year and perfectly clean, this means that the
avocado tree roots are eating all the linty junk!

below: new planting, the black circles are shallots. the round red
brick has ginger root planted it in. far right is a spaghetti squash

13 levels high now. it will be covered to be the garage.

Mothers day

2009-05-23T16:21:00.001-05:00

apple dad, plum boy and an orange mom are sitting on a pineapple sofa with marshmallow cushions. A guava cat is sitting next the the chocolate rug with more marshmallow cushions thrown around them

2009-05-07T06:45:00.000-05:00

above and below: garden is seeded

May 6. I seeded the garden. No transplants.

18 squares each divided into 4 parts.

There are still 21 one foot squares left open. ideas? missing links?

Lemon Basil
Cucumber
Various hot Peppers
Carrots
Arugula
Eggplant
Bell Peppers
Lettuces
White and purple onions
Beets
Tomatoes
Squash
Zucchini
Spinach
Watermelon
Turnip
Asparagus
Porro
Mint
Mustard greens
Marigold
Chrysanthemum
Nasturtium
Anise Hysop
Johnny Jump Up
Peppermint
Savory
Parsley
Bergamot
Fennel
Garlic Chives
Basil
Chives
Dill
Thyme
Spearmint
Chamomile

Walls and tires

2009-04-26T14:42:00.001-05:00

this wall below has a tire foundation and is painted a light
pink/white, using lime, pink clay and water. little "jarrilla"
bushes are planted in a line in front. our property is to the
left

i can get almost 80 tires in my truck in one load....!

Recent construction

2009-04-17T19:15:00.002-05:00

Garden

2009-03-11T15:42:00.001-06:00

The start of the Permaculture Garden.
Our first and the source of much excitement here.

more updates

2009-02-25T10:52:00.002-06:00

below is a window from a vw beetle. looking into the cob home

below: rare back side photo

below: front entrance. green edge on roof is the rainwater collection gutter, just put it
in yesterday. we cut a piece of 3" tubing lengthwise and slipped it around the roofing,
fast and easy and quite practical!

porch

2009-02-19T13:23:00.000-06:00

below is the porch going up

floors

2009-02-19T13:18:00.007-06:00

below, hard troweling the final layer of clay/sand with flecks of straw

below, stairs and up have the final layer, notice below, the sub floor
is cracked, this is on purpose to key in the final layer

below, painting a clay slip on the dry floor to adhere the finish coat better

below, final floor with oil and wax finish

Sunray Kelly, Bonnie and Eli makes a visitl

2009-01-17T08:40:00.011-06:00

Sunray added the roof structure onto Gabriel's treehouse

(click here to see some of Sunray's past work)

Wall plastering part 2

2009-01-17T08:34:00.002-06:00

Below, Edgar hard troweling on the lime/sand plaster

Plastering with lime and sand

2009-01-17T07:54:00.002-06:00

below is clay/straw/sand plaster on left with rough coat of lime/sand on right

below is next step, rough sand/lime on left. on the right below is putting on
a really fine lime/sand finish

below is fine finish on right polished with a yogurt top

below is our finish plaster ready to be put on the wall

interior

2009-01-09T20:17:00.002-06:00

this shot is from a month ago. i will post more soon, its pretty much done!

tree house and arched door

2009-01-09T20:13:00.003-06:00

Arches and treehouse

2008-11-01T07:40:00.002-06:00

bag work

2008-10-25T19:22:00.000-05:00

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Recent work

2008-09-27T22:26:00.008-05:00

This is why it has been so long since I have posted. It takes many weeks to complete just one job. The 2 photo's below are an earthen wall going up along the road. The foundation is rammed earth tires and they are placed in a traditional bricklike pattern. Above the foundation is around a yard of cob.

Interestingly enough to me is that I harvested all the earth for this cob wall from less than 6 feet away from this wall; when I got near the end of constructing this wall the earth physically started to change; the clay rich soil gave way to a pink clay; perfect timing; I took this clay with a 1:1 ratio of rough sand, and armful’s of chopped straw and lathered the whole wall with this.

Below photo. Trench for an earthbag retainment wall.

below is the start of the base for a table, the big wooden wheel will lay on top of this base

below is the cob oven with a lime finish

Avocado Tree

2008-08-02T20:05:00.007-05:00

Tire Wall updated

2008-08-02T19:59:00.004-05:00

tire wall

2008-08-01T19:05:00.009-05:00

Cob Oven

2008-08-01T18:55:00.008-05:00

more wall building

2008-07-16T18:44:00.006-05:00

tires

2008-07-03T15:47:00.007-05:00

below is my first job done with the tires, its a bit messy, but will
be covered in vines, and also, cannot be seen from above,
it does its job, protects land from errosion

below are the stairs leading up from the creek

below is the 3rd tire job. its getting better. green grass might be planted down here, the tires have since gotten a rough mud stucco

Mary Bohan

2008-05-01T16:32:00.002-05:00

worked with us for 2 weeks. she worked on
plastering from top to bottom

Bug to be

2008-05-01T16:01:00.003-05:00

bugs...insects.... what is this? its so neat looking while a family of 5 are eating the tiny sprouts of our beautiful to be tree, the Framboyant.
I am removing them from the tree, one squirted out its behind a thin whitish fluid with enough force to squirt a few feet, maybe a poison? Its probably an "assassin bug" this is a good "photo", of a different, documented assassin bug, explaining my theory.

below photo, same cool bug

2008-04-24T22:11:00.002-05:00

above photo is the back side with a good view of the roof. and guess what? it works, i mean the roof, it rained hard a few times and no leaks at all!

below photo is a view into the center living room window, with the kitchen wall in the back.

near completion

2008-04-19T07:07:00.003-05:00

sorry its been so long. no real reason, just been busy working and i have been quite lazy to get on the computer to show progress.

the roof was installed over a month ago. the doors and windows are now framed. electricity is in, as is plumbing. the first coat of interior plaster will start in earnest this Monday

long time no post

2008-03-13T23:12:00.005-06:00

above photo. near lunch time on the 8th of march.

above photo. the roof mock up as seen from the east walls.

above photo is our neighbor, Manuel. he is 64 years young. he mixes the cob up for us 4 hours a day, 5 days a week. hes great. he a natural cob mixer, the best i have seen and it is the first time he has ever done it.

above photo. lintels are up. this photo is from over a week ago. i hurt my knee on march 4th. a rock rolled down on it, no pain at all..... about 36 hours later, during the night it started hurting bad. the sports medicine doc is now working on it all this week.

this will be a home, not a house

2008-03-01T19:05:00.006-06:00

above photo is me, Mark Grossman. resting my pitchfork full of "cob" on the scaffolding. i am awaiting Gordons signal that he needs it

above photo is a rare back side photo. taken from our neighbors land. you can see our current home in the background.

above photo is the sleeping loft. and Ollie under playing the guitar.

above photo. Ollie in the cozy eating are. above is the wooden loft for sleeping. i am quite proud of my woodworking here.

above photo. this is the end of the week. feb. 29. leap year.

Feb. 26, 2008

2008-02-26T19:20:00.010-06:00