I’ve spent the week helping out at Llamacroft, the intergenerational sustainable housing designed by Janna Laan Lomas of Grain Architecture and Seb Laan Lomas from Architype.
They are trying to be as sustainable, natural and local as possible in their project. And fortunately they have lovely rich red clay really close to the surface.
As part of the work, we have been experimenting with making moulded earth bricks to use to make internal partitions.
I made a video showing my first go at throwing a brick. The mixture I used was:
– ⌛⌛2 parts sand
– 1 part clay
– 🌾1 part fibre (I used straw)
– 💧Water (I need less than you think! Your mixture should crumble slightly when squeezed, not be dripping wet. Too much water and the brick slumps when the mould comes off, which is exactly what I did)
This is traditional moulded earth block making (similar to adobe), one of the lowest carbon building materials there is: no firing, no cement, just soil from the ground. Part of my series of making and testing natural materials.
I finally got it to work. Again I used:
– ⌛⌛2 parts sand
– 1 part clay
– 🌾1 part fibre (I used straw)
– 💧Water: way less this time, I could pick up all the earth in one go!
This is definitely worth having a go.
