Day 12

Well, our last day was definitely bittersweet. We were trading scratches and mud for the luxury of no dirt under our fingernails, but also loved the time we spent at the Villa.

We started the morning by me, Emily, mixing plaster, while Maddy worked on a lime plaster from the inside of Massey's pod on the area that we had plastered from the outside on Wednesday. This was difficultwork because the area needed lime plaster carefully applied between every bamboo slat to attain the look that Massey desired. We were joined by special guests and former Villa Sobrante workers Cora Went and Bryn Bliska (pictured below).

After I was done mixing plaster, Cora and Maddy worked on adding more insulation and chicken wire to the roof. They then finished this by plastering with a clay based plaster after lunch. Meanwhile, I passed on my plastering knowledge to Bryn, and we worked with one of Massey's apprentices Becka on the lime plaster. We then made a silly egg concoction for lunch (after collecting 10 eggs for the day) and found out that avocados really do need to ripen after you buy them.

We finished the afternoon by plastering inside and out and getting plenty of laughs. We had such a great experience and hope you will join us for our presentation at 12:30 on Wednesday, the 25th in the Founders Lecture Hall. See you there!

Day 11

Finally a sunny day!! When the sun came up, Massey decided it was time to work on the once tarp-covered roof, an eagerly awaited project for her. We precariously climbed up on the roof, as I (Maddy) was holding on for dear life, Emily and Massey were jumping around, fitting into nooks and comfortable positions to fasten chicken wire onto the exposed part of Massey's roof. Massey wanted to keep thebamboo in one corner of her roof exposed from the bottom, in order to use as a teaching tool for natural builders learning about the uses of bamboo. She also wanted the outer edge of her roof without plaster in order to make a skylight with glass bottles, one of the many creative attributes of natural buildings.

Here is the bamboo-roof from below, awaiting plaster.

After stuffing the roof with a dryer, clay-based plater, Emily and I stopped for lunch, and when we returned, we split up into two different projects. We first mixed more plaster with lime in order to do finishing work. I kept working on Massey's pod by doing more finishing, architectural work inside while Emily worked on making a more noticeable difference between the ceiling and the wall inside Lindsay's unit.

A picture of the detail work inside Massey's pod

Emily working on Lindsay's unit.

Day 10

Yet another day in the rain and cold, but we wasted no time upon arrival and jumped right in on plastering Massey's pod. On days such as these, the women of Villa Sobrante like to work inside on detail work because this work is normally left for last, so rainy days are appreciated from time to time. We continued working on the inside arch of Massey's pod, plastering with a lime-plaster that was similar to yesterday's but containing a higher concentration of water.

We spent most of the day talking with Massey's apprentices and diligently working on detailed curves. Other than that, it was a pretty normal day at Villa Sobrante.

Day 9

We drove up to Villa Sobrante in the rain and fog at with the hopes of an early dismissal. When we arrived, we were greeted with an empty Villa. Rather than gathering around a warm fire, Massey and her apprentices were busy plastering the inside of her pod. Great. So we spent that day filling in rough chunks and creating smooth lines within her pod with a lime plaster. The plaster is just one of many more layers to both insulate and decorate the inside of the pod. Lime provides better weather proofing and coloring but the trade off is that it's harsher for both humans and the environment when compared to clay.

With plans for a fire and warm tea the next day, we left after the afternoon of cold lime plaster and returned home to warm showers.

.The patchwork of lime plaster on the inside of the pod

Summary of Week 2

Well, after a fun and eventful first week we spent our second week making, of course, more cob! Where as last week we worked mostly with Lindsay on her roof and room, we spent this week working with Trilby and Sasha. The 2 projects we spent the most time on were the new cob oven and the front wall.

The original cob oven began breaking down and was created as a temporary fix. So, with some planning from Sasha, we began to work on its successor. This oven is much larger and has space for firewood storage below it, (pictures to follow shortly!). The parts we worked on were making layers of cob and rock to create the base. We then created an arch form to mold cob around. According to Sasha, arches are the strongest architectural form, so once the cob dries it will form a strong arch that will weigh in against itself. After creating the base, we began to fill in the rest of the oven. Can't wait to see the finished product!

We spent the majority of the week working on the front wall. When we started it was merely a retaining wall with about 3 feet of cob on top, and by the time we finished all it needed was a coat of paint. We started by adding small pieces of wood on top to support the final large piece of wood which would keep rain off the wall. After those had been filled in with cob, we migrated to the bottom portion of the wall, the retaining wall, and put our plastering skills to use by plastering it with a lime plaster. On Wednesday we headed over to Daryl's to get a large piece of wood. While Maddy and I plastered, Sasha worked on the oven and Trilby cut the wood to match the curve of the wall. It was pretty tricky.

After much time spent tweaking the large piece of wood, it was finally layed on top of the wall. We then plastered with a final plaster, and aside from some final planing, the front wall was finished!

We're so excited for our last week at the Villa. This project has been such a great learning experience, and we can't wait to see what's in store!

Day 4

We switched gears today and started working with Trilby on her live roof! It was really awesome working on such an interesting project. There are some stairs built into her pod that lead to the roof, which is lined (about a 1.5 feet wide) with an empty space for a garden. First, we wired a protective barrier on top of the mesh fence, which was pretty sharp when originally cut. Then we realized we needed to lay down stones as a base layer. We had a few buckets-worth of pre-made and ready to go stones at our disposal, but for the rest of it we took some bricks found on the property and broke them up with hammers and collected them in buckets. We felt a little like prisoners but it was a pretty fun way to let some frustration out!

After this, we made an assembly line from the buckets to the roof, and layered the stones along the soon-to-be garden bed. Then we put down filter paper over the stones, working as a separating and draining device between the soil and stones. We then mixed a very specific solution of soil, consisting of super absorbent dirt-earth, sand, bark, and some normal soil. We sifted this in a wheel barrow and then put it in buckets to carry to the roof and lay evenly in the roof garden! We then cut down the filter paper so it wasn't visible, and we had a live roof ready to go! We then ended the day by preparing the bamboo gutters (large bamboo cut in half). It was great to see such progress in just one day and we can't wait to start planting in Trilby's new live roof!

Day 3

We started of today with chopping hay! What a fun task, we though to ourselves as we started, soon realizing that it was much more difficult, uncomfortable, and frustrating than expected. We were asked to chop about 2 barrels of hay using their electric hay chopper, in order to have enough to making into a paste for the finishing plaster on Lindsay's ceiling. We started out by slowly putting the hay through the hay chopper which emptied into a bag. We thought this was enough, but it turned out that it needed to be extremely fine-cut straw! So we ended up cutting the straw three times, while replacing the cutting instrument about 2-3 times. Also, emily got a little poke-bruise, courtesy of my pitch-forking abilities!

Overall, that was a big part of our day, but once we mixed in our nicely-cut straw into a paste for the ceiling, we started on another task. The plastering of the ceiling was definitely tricky. The plaster contained lime, to make the ceiling white, which is also a little toxic, so we had to wear gloves and sunglasses, while tipping our heads back to plaster a difficult ceiling. Some other women working with us were much more experienced (which put us to shame a little bit) but were still very reassuring and helpful in giving us tips! Overall, it was a tiring and fun day. More soon!

Day 2

Well, wasn't sure it was possible, but I think we managed to get even more dirty today than yesterday. After mixing another wheelbarrow worth of plaster, we went back into Lindsay's room to finish sculpting around the windows. It's amazing how much plaster we needed! After lunch we returned with yet another wheelbarrow, and even that wasn't enough.

Poor Lindsay had to listen to us make Brian Regan references the entire time. However, he is quite funny...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A194vDpXzyA

Anyway, here are a few pictures from today. Enjoy!

Maddy adds more plaster around the doorway

Mixing the plaster

First Day

Our first day was amazing! We started off by mixing clay, sand, and water to create a plaster. We then spent the morning plastering the doorways of the 2nd main house's bathroom and the entrance to Lindsay's room. After a nice lunch break (and debate about a nap), we headed back to the house to make another plaster, but added straw this time. We then spent the afternoon plastering the mixture around the windows in Lindsay's room. We went through an entire wheelbarrow of plaster and didn't even finish 3 windows!

The plasters are not the final plaster. It was important that we used the first plaster to better attach the underlying straw and the overlying bamboo. These will act as insulation under the final plaster, which can be colored and smoothed to be more aesthetically pleasing.

Not going to lie, playing with mud and getting filthy is infinitely better than sitting in class when the weather is this gorgeous. Tomorrow we're going to finish all the windows in Lindsay's room. Can't wait!

-E&M