[Cob] re: cob in ohio

[Thomas Gorman]

I can certainly understand wanting to hold onto a dream of building  
what you want, how you want- building a cob house for ourselves  
quickly became our dream/obsession, too.  But bear in mind the  
importance of 'appropriate technology.'  A lot of 'conventional'  
construction fails at efficiency (and fails environmentally too)  
because it's design is based on ideas developed in locales and  
climates and 'imported' to areas where it isn't ideal (hacienda-style  
in the north east!?).  You may have to be flexible with your dreams  
and designs and mix and match several techniques in your building.   
As I've learned more and more our dream design has evolved to better  
fit our likely site and climate in upstate NY, and cob has  
accordingly (if a little sadly) become a smaller part of the overall  
scheme.  A purist, load-bearing cob structure might economically and  
aesthetically be a wonderful thing, but we've realized that it just  
wouldn't be appropriate for the climate, so likely now we'll build  
some combination of timber-frame with strawbale or clay-slip straw  
infill for the north, east and west walls and concentrate the cob  
(and glass) in the southern wall and for interior masses.  It  
complicates things, and makes it all seem a little bit less  
'sculptural,' but in the end we'll have a more efficient and  
appropriate house.  And there'll still be plenty of places for garden  
walls and an outdoor oven of cob, and maybe a summer guest cabin!