The Rising Soil Collective is a community of activists and builders who are committed to cultivating a lifestyle more closely aligned with our values of simplicity, sustainability and earth-centric living, which inspire us to gather and create earth-based architecture. The building projects are about more than creating a finished structure, they are about fostering community around a shared love for earth building and supporting one other in the pursuit to actualize our unique dreams. The name Rising Soil implies the nature of the building we do, earth sculpting, while also holding a vision for the larger culture. We intend for our work to motivate others in embracing a healthy and sustainable lifestyle.
To form a community of EarthMasons (skilled and proficient natural builders) who engage in earth-centric building for the common good. We offer our hands to the project in exchange for the creative experience and shared community. Our system is a work exchange, where services offered to the community are repaid in community support toward a personal building project.
"The inspiration for this project came to me in realizing that I had been telling myself my dreams of living in an earthen home were never going to materialize; that my dreams were to difficult to conceive or too far fetched. I began to recognize that the fears I had about my dreams were not mine but rather fears placed on me by the larger society and culture. Upon realizing these imposed limitations for what my life can achieve I began to shift my paradigm, feeling empowered to live truer to myself. I believe my work and the work of Rising Soil Collective involves supporting others in a similar unfolding."
Katie Markley , aspiring earth-based art
therapist and mastermind behind The Rising
Soil Collective
"For as long as I can remember, Ive dreamt of creating a communal living space. Of course the look and logistical framework has changed countless times, but what Im certain about is that Im inspired by those around me. Im challenged and comforted by the people in my life who are creating art, who are actively taking part in caring for the earth, who are looking to give to their community rather than simply live within it. To surround myself by heartfelt, motivated individuals is a goal and a major honor. This year, I was fortunate enough to acquire a dynamite piece of property and a home. Through a series of conversations, Katie presented the idea for Rising Soil Collective to me and it was undeniably clear that this is what Id been waiting for and why I own this parcel in the first place. Collecting like minded people and together, empowering one another by association. What a wonderful thing it is to be human."
Calais Cervetti, artist, builder,
and generally absorbant mind and heart
"I envision earthen structures as being the perfect setting for the therapeutic process to unfold. Imagine the opportunity for people to enter a healing environment, the earth, which holds and shelters them while they navigate the fragility of their being. Opportunities are offered for clients to sculpt with the earth and participate in community building projects."
therapist and mastermind behind The
Rising Soil Collective
We're EarthMasons : A network of passionate women and men who craft natural buildings for each other and ourselves. Our technique is rooted in the values of craftsmanship and artful expression.
We specialize in building with cob, as well as other natural material such as strawbale, cordwood and recycled and repurposed materials such as glass, car tires, drift wood, etc. Essentially, our building style is earthship inspired - we collect reclaimed materials, which inform and enhance our work.
Cob (or Cobb) is a building material made of a varying mixtures of clay, sand, straw, water, and soil (similar to adobe, but using more straw). The word,cob, has nothing to do with corn, but rather it comes from an old English root meaning lump or rounded mass. Cob walls are hand-built without the use of forms, ramming, or bricks which is why it lends itself so well to creating artistic, organic, sculptural shapes within the building design. Its also fireproof and very resistant to seismic activity, rain, and cold which makes it ideally suited well to both cold climates and desert conditions.
Cob Resources:
Mud Girls (A Collective of Cob-building women in Washington)
Cob Cottage
The Year of Mud (Blog by a man during the building of his first cob home)
Cob Projects
Green Building Elements
Build Something Beautiful (Fantastic photos of cob building at every stage!)
Cordwood construction is a method of building in which "cordwood" or short pieces of bark-free lumber are stacked width-wise within the wall amongst masonry or cob. It's also known as "cordwood masonry" or "stackwall/wood construction"
Cordwood Resources:
Earthenwood Building School
Green Home Building
DayCreek
Straw-Bale construction uses bales of wheat, rice, rye, and/or oat straw as structural load-bearing wall elements, wall insulation, or both simultaneously. The foundation wall is built up using a waterproof building material, and the straw bales are set and stabilized on top of the base wall. The straw walls are then stuccoed or plastered either with a cement-based mix, lime-based formulation, or earth/clay render.
Strawbale Resources:
Strawbale.Com
The Last Straw
Design of Straw Bale Buildings. Bruce King. Chelsea Green Publishing, 2007.
More Straw Bale Building: A Complete Guide to Designing and Building with Straw. Chris Magwood. New Society Publishers, 2005.
Straw Bale House, The. Steen, Steen, Bainbridge & Eisenberg. White River Junction, Vermont: Chelsea Green, 1994.
Building a Straw Bale House. Nathaniel Corum. Princeton Architectural Press, 2005.
Building with earthbags is both old and new. Sandbags have long been used, particularly by the military, for creating strong, protective barriers, or for flood control. The same reasons that make them useful for these applications carry over to creating housing. Since the walls are so substantial, they resist all kinds of severe weather (or even bullets) and also stand up to natural calamities such as earthquakes and floods. They can be erected simply and quickly with readily available components, for very little money.
Earthbag buiding or Superadobe (a sandbag and barbed wire technique founded buy architect, Nader Khalili) technology involves long or short sandbags which are filled with on-site earth and arranged in layers or long coils (compression) with strands of barbed wire placed between them to act as both mortar and reinforcement (tension). Stabilizers such as cement, lime, or asphalt emulsion may be added.
Earthbag Resources:
http://calearth.org/
http://www.earthbagbuilding.com/
A earthship house is made up of rammed earth and tires. The tires are stacked (staggered) like bricks. Each tire has earth pounded into them until firmly packed. Once the tires are packed, they are very difficult to move and form quite a dense wall. The walls are load bearing and provide thermal mass which is an important attribute to any energy efficient house. Thermal mass stores heat and releases the heat slowly. This keeps indoor temperature constant while outside temperatures fluctuate. Once the walls are in place, the walls are quite often plastered over and appear very similar to an adobe style house.
Earthship Resources:
http://earthship.com/
www.dreamgreenhomes.com
www.daycreek.com
In truth, there are a billion and one ways to build a home that's sustainable and earth-healthy, but we've tried to hit on a few of the main options.
Our plan is to sculpt an earthen home (most likely cob) on a $3000 budget within the course of five months. The home will serve as a residence for an art therapist, enabling her to pioneer a practice of earth-based art therapy. Well be arranging work parties to engage a community of passionate builders.
Top Photo: What will soon be the view from the front door of the home.
We'll be tearing down a rotting shed and replacing it with a beautifully hand-raised home complete with composting toilet. You cant tell from the upper photo, but take a look at the lower picture and you can kind of see that theres a creek running through the ravine... which means that right out the front door of the new home will be a precious little seasonal creek. Really, does it get any better than this?
Design by: Mike Dearborn
Building Site
click to enlarge
Where will we go from here? Well, it seems the opportunities are endless. We've got a few ideas, but we're leaving it open for now...letting inspiration guide us when that time comes.
What's on your Mind?
We'd love to hear what you're thinking about...and chat with you about it!
We also have a news blog you can access at the top of the page. It's complete with comment-capability, so visit, read, write!
- coming soon -
