Building with Purpose: The Straw Bale House Experience - Jo Bolton & Matt Whitaker - BS102

Jeffrey Hart: 0:36

Welcome to the Building Sustainability Podcast. With me, jeffrey Hart, every fortnight. Join me as I talk to designers, builders, makers, dreamers and doers. Together we can explore the wide world of sustainability in the built environment by talking to wonderful people who are doing excellent things. Hello and welcome to Episode 102. This episode's guests are once again the wonderful Joe Bolton and Matt Whitaker of Abundant Earth. The previous episode, 101, was also with Joe and Matt talking about their intentional community, abundant Earth. Today we are discussing the creation of their stunning straw bale house where this conversation was recorded. I would say that this episode is certainly standalone, but if you listen to Episode 101 first, you might have a little more context of the setting and just how delightful Joe and Matt are. Before the episode we have got news the Woodland Pioneers. So back in October of last year you had three episodes from the Woodland Pioneers event. That was all about coppicing. I'll put a link to those if you want to listen. But the Woodland Pioneers event is coming around again. It runs from Monday August 28th for five days. There is a link to the event in the show notes if you want to immerse yourself in the coppice scene with coppice workers making lovely coppice crafts. It's a really really brilliant event with such good people. Yeah, get yourself involved with that. Also happening at the same time actually is the European straw bale gathering happening in Denmark this year. That is from August 31st to the 3rd of September. If you're interested in straw bale building in a big way, that would be a great thing to get to. Also wanted to say the latest episode of The Last Straw Journal is out. It's excellent. It's the biggest volume they've done so far. Really really good read. So if you're into the alternative journal of design and construction for dirtbags and dreamers, which I imagine you probably are, then get yourself a copy of that. A link is in the show notes. No new patrons this week, so just time to say thank you to all of the patrons that already exist and say if you want to support the podcast financially, then you can by going to patreoncom forward slash building sustainability. I think that's it. We'll keep it nice and succinct today. I'm back at the end very briefly, but until then, enjoy the one for Joe and Matt. So we're, we're sat in your beautiful, beautiful house. Can you, well, can you describe sort of what it is and what the vision was?

Matt Whitaker : 3:46

So there's a straw bale house and it's just a loaded straw bale house, i suppose Nebraska style, i think they call it, don't they? So all of the weight of the building is on straw bales. There's lots of timber frame. The idea of it was to build a house that didn't touch the woodland that it sits on. So there's lots. It's kind of a wieterbeck shape. There's two stories, a wieterbeck shape, and then on one end of the final wieterbecks there's a circle like a big yurt, because we've lived in a yurt And on top of each of the roofs there's a big curtain roof behind it where the retaining wall because it's set down in a bank, a little bit Built a retaining wall with big tires from trucks that holds the bank side. So the ground floor sits kind of in the bank side. First floor is up above and it's got a turf roof on and there's this curtain roof that reaches out towards the tires And then there's a final turf roof on the circle above on top of the wieterbecks, and each of those turf roofs has the idea was just to replace the woodland. So at the moment, like on the curtain roof, the woodland stretches down the bank and then you can see it splatter up the side of the house. Really, on the roof There's blue bells and then there's even dogs, mercury, you know, like an ancient woodland indicator which has spread itself up onto the roof as well. So it's kind of this. What I wanted was a seamless kind of something that sat in its environment without having hurt it. We chopped down one tree, one big tree, which is this oak beam that's above us. We cut that down by hand and then we sort of chainsaw, milled it and hewed it with axes to make it look pretty. But you know, that was the one sacrifice the land had to make for this house really. So that was the idea of it to make a house that was both good for the people inside it. Plenty of curves and natural materials, you know, stuff to feed the soul but also good and nourishing for the land around it.

Jo Bolton: 6:03

And actually the, the usable space that happens underneath that outside curtain is a really good cellar space because it's in the earth. It's really good, cool. So that's, that's our pantry area, and then the bike shed.

Matt Whitaker : 6:18

Yeah, i was really interested in lime and earth and yeah, i've read a few books on it and, like the timber frame, the other house that was wrapped in straw bales, yeah, but I wanted to make you know the Nebraska style that was loaded and how high could you go. So this one's three stories and it's got a second. Storage Has been a little push on the straw bales, right Been some. We've just finished the top part and you know, as you go up and up and put more earth on, you know, despite the best efforts at compressing those bales with straps and things, there have been a few little compression cracks over the years as things have settled and finally added to it.

Jo Bolton: 7:02

But you did also want to go for this style to make it less labor intensive and quicker, so there wasn't a timber frame as well.

Matt Whitaker : 7:10

I'm not sure that really worked. I'm not sure there is an easy building, really, as there are different ways of building But none of them are quicker, it turns out.

Jo Bolton: 7:21

This one certainly hasn't been, but If you're going to do it all by hand.

Matt Whitaker : 7:25

Yeah, i mean, lots of the mixing of this has been done with a petrol powered mixer, right, but the previous house, we all did it all in a bathtub and certainly lots of the earth renders were done in that bathtub. It's still in the yard there, so yeah.

Jeffrey Hart: 7:44

Did, so that I mean we're sat in the sort of circular end. now You said you lived in Yerts and so that felt like a circle. Yeah, there's something pretty magic about them, isn't there? Like. Can you put into words what that is?

Matt Whitaker : 8:06

For me it's the lack of straight edges. There's no end to it. It's just this continuum of space. It just flows into itself. It's really annoying to build furniture for it, But in every other sense it just feels good to the soul. It sits comfortably on the eye and then soaks in and this yeah, it's a flowing form.

Jo Bolton: 8:32

Yeah, it feels like a soft space to live, I think.

Matt Whitaker : 8:35

Yeah, well, yeah, despite its difficulties for fitting shelves and the likes, definitely do it again. Yeah, but a circle isn't necessarily. There's a reason why people build in the squares, i think, but there's also a reason to build in circles. Roundhouses have been along for a very long time, haven't they? And I'm sure I mean yeah. I mean, there's a strength in a circle too. The firewood piles up in the top show that They're self-supporting. But yeah, for me it's just the way they feel and look. They're just soft, beautiful. And this one is lumpy and flowing as well, because our plastering technique and our bales were eaten by rats so we had to re-tie them. So they weren't the best bales by the time, but even that we built this house on rat-to-tooth bales It's still here 14 years later. It's a very durable, wonderful tony, isn't it So?

Jo Bolton: 9:43

Yes.

Jeffrey Hart: 9:43

And to say you're, i mean your walls aren't overly lumpy. Certainly seem lumpy walls Yeah. I guess it's. There's something I'm sort of I'm trying to sort of find the words to describe it because of my earth floors. There's a beauty in that slight undulation and it's hand-finished and even when it looks flat, if you walk around on it, there's an ever so slight And that feels really good and it feels really see I haven't got the words for it yet So natural, yeah. And then, yeah, all these people are getting their laser flat concrete floors or and, yeah, you don't get the same sort of multi-sensory feeling from it.

Jo Bolton: 10:41

Yeah, i wonder if it is the I'm imagining walking on an earth floor and that that feedback that we have from our bodies. our bodies are designed to kind of, you know, to feel for safety and to respond to the surfaces we touch. So there's something that's a little bit more give and take, a bit of yielding, a bit of receiving from the, the spaces that we're in touch with And I imagine that happens a bit with our eyes on a soft wall that there's something that's a bit give and take. there's a bit of movement between us and the surface that we're meeting. Yeah, yeah, i'm thought of that. It's always the thing, isn't it?

Jeffrey Hart: 11:23

people, say, natural buildings feel better, and I'm always sort of trying to trying to uncover what that is. What is that?

Matt Whitaker : 11:32

Yeah, People often say about this building and perhaps other natural buildings, that feel like it's been here forever, even after it was just built. someone walked around and said, oh, it's got that feel of of like it's from the 14th century or something, and that's, that's only. I think, because it's natural materials And you know, it's like fire as it's been with us for so long, and that's why everyone is touched and moved by fire. sitting around a campfire, blacksmithing whatever it is. But no, also natural materials, part of us as as society, as the history in the last 10,000 years, at least, not before before that as well.

Jo Bolton: 12:12

Nature's moving, like there's bats already in the in the roof. It's like it's like the building's been received by the woodland as well. Wow.

Jeffrey Hart: 12:22

Can I give them a thumbs?

Jo Bolton: 12:23

up. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Matt Whitaker : 12:25

Yeah, that softness of of surface though I think you're, you're right on that. You can get something generally flat, but then it's not. You walk along it, pad along it softly. Your body has to move and go with the flow. Is that going with the flow for me? That movement of materials and how they stretch then into their environment and the people that use them, and if it doesn't touch you in the soul, it's. You know, i won't name any big building companies, but they build houses that are square, flat, featureless, soulless places that do not feed the soul, in my opinion. They offer a place to stay warm and dry, but in order to, you know, i can sit here and look at the walls, watch the shadows, and it's like a television in itself. You know the movement of life that comes through the windows. The sun darkens, with a black cloud passing over. It offers this texture that is received inside from outside. You know it's a connection.

Jo Bolton: 13:32

I think it's human energy as well, the amount of human energy that goes into this kind of building. You know we can look around and remember. Can you remember when this person were here and can you remember what that was like, how long they stayed for the conversations that we had? There is so much human energy, so many hours of human energy in this house and I think we receive that as when we're being in a space, like going into a cathedral and just feeling that the ancient, the amount of voices, prayer, energy that's held in the space. I'm not comparing this to a cathedral, but in terms of the human energy that's put in here, there's been a lot of hours, yeah and how did you like, how did you get lots of people to come and help?

Jeffrey Hart: 14:26

Did you run it as workshops? Was it friends, family?

Jo Bolton: 14:29

Because we were part of a Wuff scheme.

Matt Whitaker : 14:32

We had some Wuff help and we had a couple of but we had Ross. Kieran. Andy paid a little bit of money, some pocket money, and they stayed and lived here.

Jo Bolton: 14:48

A couple of years.

Matt Whitaker : 14:49

Yeah, andy stayed here a couple of years, ross stayed here a year and a half. You know they were young fellows that really wanted to come and build and be part of a project like this. So you know their energy just rolled the whole thing, kept it moving. And then, you know, they had friends and sometimes, when we initially laid the earth floor before the well erupted, between up from the floor we had, you know, 20 people laying the earth floor and it took a day. It was down. Amazing, amazing effort, you know. Same with the straw bale, the plastering. How many tons of earth have gone into this building? I do not know, but it is, you know, 100, at least 100 tons of earth plaster and lime plaster and that is a lot of mixing and a lot of people. You know you have days when there were 10 people, days when there were two people, days where there were 30 people that would be outside mixing in here all of the various jobs.

Jo Bolton: 15:53

It has been you through the whole thing, with various people coming to help Keir and Helper putting some drawings together at the beginning because he was training to be an architect. Many different people to name.

Matt Whitaker : 16:07

It was going to be done in a year and a half. That kept everyone going for a while and then they ceased to believe me and I ceased to believe myself. But yeah it was no formal way. It was really. People would come and they did either stay for a day or they'd stay for six months or two years, as we've said.

Jo Bolton: 16:30

Because we can offer people somewhere to live as well. Basics, somewhere, basic to live.

Matt Whitaker : 16:35

Being fed from the garden. You cooked a lot of bread and cake in those days.

Jeffrey Hart: 16:41

Essential, and so how long did it take?

Matt Whitaker : 16:46

Before we moved in. it was a couple of years, but we just moved into one place and then kept working Because we had moved out and stayed in the village for a year because we were all sharing the first house. There were eight of us in a two bedroom, one kitchen house. We were living and working together and sometimes that was a little testing. So we moved out.

Jo Bolton: 17:15

I was ill, i got ME, and so we got a place in the village where we just went for weekends.

Jeffrey Hart: 17:24

We just needed some rest by from living all later of us in a small house.

Matt Whitaker : 17:37

So, yeah, a year, two years, we were in and living in it and still working. I took two years out from the business. Really, i earned enough money to pay my wages, such that they were at the time 25 pounds a week. I think we might have gone up to 50 pounds a week by then. The big money Yeah, absolutely. So I earned enough money to do that. But everything else was this It was full time Yeah, pretty full on, but lovely, beautiful, it was what I wanted to do, so it was no problem.

Jo Bolton: 18:12

The phone having those Andrew, keefer and Ross here, it was really gorgeous.

Matt Whitaker : 18:19

Having a crew that were all into it, We'd get through the jobs. yeah, and see it going up and seeing it evolve. It felt like it was because you have to build it from the floor up. We had a big sheet over the top of it. That also took you know, so it grew and the sheet would go up and it was like a mushroom coming up from the ground. You do one level and then start the next. But even the sheet was working itself. It would rain and puddles would go on the sheet and you'd have to wake up two o'clock in the middle of the night and push a stick and all the pl. You know it's just now, all of that. you know we talked earlier about waking up at three o'clock and sorting out problems in head. You know, it wasn't just, you know, the daytime building, it was the working out of problems in the middle of the night.

Jeffrey Hart: 19:08

Yeah, you know it, i know it. So, so well, yeah and you just be sort of talking to someone, you're looking their eye and suddenly you're like that joins into that in that way and I've solved the problem. Yeah, Oh sorry, I was focusing on the camera.

Matt Whitaker : 19:30

Because of all consuming isn't it. Yeah, very much so.

Jeffrey Hart: 19:34

So did the people that helped and stayed for a long time. Did they carry on building?

Matt Whitaker : 19:42

The architect is still an architect, the lad. He's more into gardening and looking after plants and trees. Now, yeah, yeah, i mean he builds lots of nice steps in the gardens with his woodworking and stuff like that.

Jeffrey Hart: 20:02

It's definitely taken some of the skills.

Matt Whitaker : 20:04

Yeah, But no, the architect is. he got his first job because of this place. Right He showed the plans that he'd drawn for this to the company he wanted to work with because they had a big green building aspect to their business. So on the back of what he'd done here, he got his first job and has moved forward, which was definitely helpful for him. Brilliant.

Jo Bolton: 20:29

Yeah, and we don't see Auntie so much anymore.

Matt Whitaker : 20:32

No, no, he's always been a bit of a dark course anyway, hasn't he His own body likes hanging out with monks, doesn't he Being very quiet?

Jeffrey Hart: 20:43

He's the Buddhist Right Okay.

Jo Bolton: 20:46

So he's quite involved with the Buddhist movement.

Matt Whitaker : 20:50

Like monastery out in Osama. But sometimes it's not about, is it? It's not about whether you're going to be a builder. That's it, isn't it?

Jo Bolton: 21:00

It's that it just feeds you in a way that you need at the time And being in a particular stage of life, that learning stage, that kind of, you know, having a what is out there, absorbing what is out there, what the possibilities.

Jeffrey Hart: 21:13

being in community is often enough When I ran Heartwind, so we'd take 10 people and build a house with them, and I got people to sort of select in the application process. Would have 100 people apply and I got people to say what their reason for applying was, and it was. You know, i want to be a natural builder. I'm sort of taking a break from my career, and one was just I want a life experience. And every you know I picked a certain amount of people from each group And I felt that was really important to bring those people together for an experience, community experience. I think people were perhaps afraid to tick the I want a life experience box because I wondered if people imagined that to be a sort of negative from my perspective.

Matt Whitaker : 22:13

It's not worthy enough.

Jeffrey Hart: 22:14

Yeah, I only want to train natural builders, but no, I really wanted. I think there's so much value in the people that came who were in that sort of category. I think they had a lovely time. Yeah, they've gone about and done whatever they've done afterwards.

Matt Whitaker : 22:31

And they've talked about this wonderful natural building to so many other people that would not be in contact with that knowledge otherwise, which is really important for society in this problem of concrete being used for everything.

Jo Bolton: 22:48

And I think actually it takes more courage to step out of your usual life for an original life experience that will inform the rest of your life but not necessarily be. You know, it's not necessarily on a linear route.

Jeffrey Hart: 23:05

Yeah, yeah, so you mentioned you had an earth floor. Yeah, tell me first of all about living with the earth floor before pre-flood.

Matt Whitaker : 23:23

Yeah Well, the earth floor beautiful, undulating gorgeousness, felt connected to the earth despite damp courses and things.

Jo Bolton: 23:34

That was the reason that we wanted to do it that we wanted to stay very connected. We didn't want there to be gap between us and the earth.

Matt Whitaker : 23:45

So it was lovely. It was beautiful. We'd love to have one still.

Jo Bolton: 23:49

Held the heat really well, so we'd wake up in the morning because it had underfloor heating. We'd wake up in the morning with the house being really warm.

Matt Whitaker : 23:59

But it wasn't a big deal because when we dug the hole for the house in the bank side, we were just digging one last hole in order to put this rainwater collection system and the digger was digging a hole. We had a little mini digger and amazing guy called Keith who was just a force of nature himself in his own way. So he dug this hole and all of a sudden we'd been hitting grey clay layer, which is what's over the top of our aquifer here. But mostly it was fine. There was one place on the back where it folded a little and the grey clay came up and we needed to stop digging at that point, because that's the cap of the aquifer. It's quite thick, it's like two foot thick, but unfortunately, where the hole we were digging was, it was quite thin clay layer there and it folded and came right up in the landscape there just a little anomaly. So the digger went through it and all of a sudden there was this geyser of water. This is before we even started building A good two or three foot, as the pressure in the aquifer was released and then we stood there lamely, trying to pat down with our feet some clay back in this seeping landscape feature. That was the aquifer just draining. I mean, it drains all over the land. There's wet patches all over, but we just created one above the building site So we could no longer build the house until we capped that. So we had to case on a well with concrete rings and that was another job entirely Build a crane to lift them in and that kind of thing. It was a great engineering thing and also it gave the site here a water.

Jo Bolton: 25:40

How lucky what a dream to find an aquifer, to find that we have our own water on site. We no longer had to carry 25 litre containers in from people's tanks.

Matt Whitaker : 25:52

There was also definitely a bit of head scratching and swearing that went on initially because we couldn't start. So we made the well. We thought we capped it quite well and we have genuine generally. but we installed the earth floor and the well was taking its own course. in other places We case on it we'd sealed it off with some special clay bentonite, but there were other roots being found as well, so it erupted inside. So we had to dig the clay floor up and sort out the last of the issues that were caused at that time. So that was definitely a low point in the entire thing for me.

Jo Bolton: 26:43

It was interesting. I thought about the floor, living with it. I'm wondering about the underfloor heating, because we had a gorgeous ambient temperature but we couldn't quite get the room warm enough in the evening.

Matt Whitaker : 26:59

So it was the ambient temperature was it was probably a bit thick, was there?

Jeffrey Hart: 27:06

insulation underneath.

Matt Whitaker : 27:07

Yes, hussable, it's that kind of expanded glass.

Jo Bolton: 27:14

Oh yeah, it comes in nuggets.

Matt Whitaker : 27:16

Yes, it looks like coal. Yes, all the stuff inside an aero bar. Yes, i didn't know anything about air floors, apart from reading a bit. This was like 14, 15 years ago, so it was the same as store-bale A lot of sand in the clay mixes. Then I hear that there's less sand being put into earth mixes these days, but that's the stuff that was written in books back then. So, a lime on the inside? I don't really need to have a lime on the inside, but that's what I took from those few books that I'd read. So it's the same with the floor. It was an experiment which we probably could have lived with because it was beautiful and gorgeous. It was probably a bit thick, and then there was a water issue from the aquifer that hadn't quite been dealt with properly.

Jeffrey Hart: 28:13

And you didn't feel like you wanted to put it back in.

Matt Whitaker : 28:19

No, because it was a lot of work And we had lots of oak left over from what we talked about earlier, from the all the oak trees That we'd had for the first house. So it just seemed you know, i knew floating floors and We put that in sheeps or insulation or that kind of stuff.

Jo Bolton: 28:40

So and we were worried that we might have that problem again. I think mm-hmm, i suppose it's a because we are on a, on a spring.

Jeffrey Hart: 28:49

We've built a house on top of spring. Yeah, fair enough. I can very much understand your, your reasoning, yeah.

Matt Whitaker : 29:00

Yeah, you know it's quite a big kick in the teeth. I have to dig up your floor. Having to undo, Yeah, something you know how long it took is sort of a devastating thing, Yeah, so that was definitely the the big thing about this whole house build the thing I do differently about it right would be definitely have sorted that well out and have sorted out the uh, the damp coursing underneath the back and rerouted lots more french drains and You know. But as we were talking about earlier mistakes, great teachers, so Yeah, wasn't the end of the world, it was just a step backwards.

Jeffrey Hart: 29:43

Um, and then so you mentioned that you kind of You knew how to do this from books, that the whole house building floor, um, yeah, how, how prepared.

Matt Whitaker : 29:56

Do you think that made you? Uh, i'd been building quite a few things previously. We mucked about with earth bags, structures are built, straw bale, round houses with reciprocal roofs, buddhist place. I've been building lots of little buildings and then we built the building over there with the timber frame. You know that was two or three years of pretty serious. You know, taught myself how to slate and plum and do electrics and straw bale and plaster. You know none of it. You know the best in the world, but it was a good learning ground. So this, this felt like Yeah, i've got enough skills in order to do it. But again, it was another learning learning curve In so many ways. You know it was different in so many ways the loaded straw bale thing. But no, i truly believe that Natural building offers you this Amazing ability to build a house yourself with limited skills. You know these, these materials are in us. You know they've been with us for millennia and Then they're not. They don't require any special skills other than a desire to build. Really, they offer you so much in the fact that you know They're, they're natural, they're free, often if you live in a woodland or you know, but also They're offering this knowledge that I think is impeded in this as a species. You know you look at a bit of wood and some sticks. You know a child can build a simple structure out of sticks and leaves. You know That's all it is really. It's playing. It's playing with how to build. You know So, and they inform you as much as you inform it. So, so there's a lot of that. But the books, you know, and now we've got youtube and And people that actually know what they're doing, if you go on courses and things, you know I should have gone on some courses probably, but I didn't know about any. We didn't have internet here in the woods, did we?

Jo Bolton: 31:58

Until did it even exist? It existed, we just didn't know about it. So, and there was a lot of less people doing it and, yeah, just wasn't.

Matt Whitaker : 32:12

Wasn't mainstream, it wasn't.

Jeffrey Hart: 32:15

Yeah, probably some pockets in whales that were really pushing it. But, we didn't know about them.

Matt Whitaker : 32:22

Yeah, just like I didn't know, there was a load of green woodworkers that met up in a field once a year, seven, eight years ago, when 4g finally hit us.

Jeffrey Hart: 32:34

So yeah, is there a spot in the house that you really, that is your, your sort of favorite, a bit that you will, you're drawn to.

Jo Bolton: 32:45

Well, because our bedroom has just been finished bedroom And our bed with, because we've got it's a reciprocal roof and there's a, there's a big glass window, um, which, yes, i, when we were building it, i was against I just because I just wanted it to be done. So just just cover it up, just Put wood over it, it doesn't matter, just get it, let's get, let's just get in, but it's, it's glass and we can lay in bed and look at the stars which is really beautiful, and we've only been in there since Christmas, so it's yeah. At the moment, laying in bed looking at the sky, watching the clouds pass over, is it's my favorite place at the level of it as well, means that we're up in the tops of the trees.

Matt Whitaker : 33:38

So we get to see the canopy of the, the trees and all of the life that's going on that. That you can just lie in bed and look forwards and see that level of life. That is often. Often, you spend most of your time looking at your feet, don't you? Yeah, being able to look up at that level is quite a treat as well. I'm waking up in the morning to that, not just going to sleep with the moon and the stars above you, but waking up in the morning. Sometimes I've looked up and the buzzards that fly over this valley have been wheeling. They're just lofted from a tree nearby and they're trying to get some height.

Jo Bolton: 34:12

It's just very special And hearing the rain again at night. Going to sleep, hearing the rain because, living in a year Though that was, that was one of the my. For me, the best things is hearing the rain And strawbell house. It felt really strange at first because it feels we're so insulated, but it means we can't hear what's happening in the, in the woods the weather, miss out on the owls Yeah. Yes, but up there, Yeah, it feels like we're back into contact.

Jeffrey Hart: 34:41

Yeah, i felt the exact same thing. You lived on, lived on a boat and then lived in caravan when I was building my house and then suddenly I was in this Really well sealed insulated space. It's very quiet isn't it. I feel disconnected, but I've got a skylight above my bed. I really love that. Like That sort of thing when you turn off the light and The moonlight so bright coming through, and you know, oh, didn't really make any difference.

Jo Bolton: 35:13

Yeah, yeah.

Jeffrey Hart: 35:14

Gets you kind of into that Rhythm, i guess.

Matt Whitaker : 35:20

Yeah, yeah, that nature connection.

Jeffrey Hart: 35:26

So easy to lose Yeah.

Matt Whitaker : 35:29

I'd say that's my favourite space as well. It feels calm up there. The rest of the house has got the detritus of life, the bags that you've put down, the mugs you haven't picked up, and although it's lovely space, the bedroom feels clear, uncluttered and up in space.

Jeffrey Hart: 35:51

So that's the second story.

Matt Whitaker : 35:54

Third, okay, the third story Yeah, Ground first second.

Jo Bolton: 35:58

Yes, okay.

Matt Whitaker : 36:01

How you do it isn't it?

Jeffrey Hart: 36:02

Yeah, In America they do one, two, three. Yeah, that makes more sense to me. It confuses everyone when they go to the other country, though. Yeah, i don't know of really any three-story load-bearing straw bale No.

Matt Whitaker : 36:25

In fact, when I was in my training years.

Jeffrey Hart: 36:27

I don't remember them. Barbara Jones saying it's definitely possible, but no one's done it yet We thought we had to really Yeah.

Jo Bolton: 36:39

You thought we had to.

Jeffrey Hart: 36:41

You just wanted a really finished house.

Matt Whitaker : 36:44

We thought we had to. I thought we had to. I did not think we had to, i thought I'd like to, to see what the technology was capable of doing. It's definitely stretched, i think, to its limits.

Jeffrey Hart: 37:01

You wouldn't be tempted to put another.

Matt Whitaker : 37:03

No, i've. Yeah, It's straws and camels backs comes to mind, you know, every layer of earth or every new floor The whole place is, you know, not dangerously, but it's just compressed that little bit. It doesn't take much of a compression, you know. It could have just be like a quarter of an inch, but then the plaster downstairs is taking out right, so there'll be another little crack. Or just over there There's, you know, being that sits on a little shelf. Oh yeah, the plaster that bit four times now is just so. This should be it, it's fine.

Jeffrey Hart: 37:40

Settled in. It's a very clever system.

Matt Whitaker : 37:42

You know the straw bales technically can take the weight itself. But then when you put the walls on the outside, the two layers of plaster, you've got a stress skinned panel which is used in lots of conventional building. You know, so it's actually the plaster that's taking the weight after a while. You know, plaster in some places is two, three inches thick on either side, just because of the straw bales being quite so wibbly after the rats that there go. So so yeah it's. It's a great building technique. It's one problem, i think, is that you have to put the roof on last, which is problematic if you haven't got lots of scaffolding and stuff like that. So yeah, that's tricky that way.

Jeffrey Hart: 38:26

Really being a push sort of more recently in the straw bale building to how to develop techniques for building a roof first and then dropping it. Be difficult at this height, but yeah, certainly sort of single story buildings People are building it first and then dropping it or lowering it onto the bales.

Matt Whitaker : 38:46

Yeah, that's the latest Barbara Jones book touches on those structures.

Jeffrey Hart: 38:51

Yeah right, it's, yeah, it's a fascinating process of knocking out wedges so that the roof slowly compresses down, right, right And everyone sort of you know, surely it's going to fall over and it just sits quite nicely.

Matt Whitaker : 39:07

Yeah, so it's still moving on now, as more and more get us build, you learn from your mistakes again, isn't it? Yes?

Jeffrey Hart: 39:14

yeah, find efficiencies and benefits of doing other things.

Jo Bolton: 39:20

I think we imagined that if we had enough people to take it up quickly, that it would be okay that we'd get the straw belts all in, because we did the without doing the top tower. But actually just nothing happens as quick as we'd like it to, does it?

Matt Whitaker : 39:41

No, no, estimating how long something you've never done, yeah, estimating something, how long something you haven't done before, is tricky enough, isn't it? Yeah, definitely In a lot of when you chuck loads of unknowns at something. Yeah, just mixing plaster electrics, god bless me. So a lot going on in the house, yeah, and each thing takes a long time. So, yeah, it's lovely to be in that bedroom, it feels. Although the house isn't complete, it feels like a completion of sorts.

Jo Bolton: 40:13

But the only thing really to still complete is the greenhouse on the front Interesting.

Jeffrey Hart: 40:21

So a wrap around south side, it's not that big timber frame just there in front of the kitchen.

Jo Bolton: 40:28

Because if the wittebix it's the sort of this is the round bit and then it's the other bit to make the wittebix shape.

Matt Whitaker : 40:36

It's had a bit cut out of the front edge of the wittebix on the kitchen side.

Jeffrey Hart: 40:41

I love that you call it a wittebix. That's what it looked like. Yeah, all the plans. It's a great descriptor.

Matt Whitaker : 40:49

It's the shape.

Jo Bolton: 40:50

Yeah, And so it'll be a two story greenhouse And then the kids have got a balcony up there as well, that they've got on the top of it, they've got a little door on the outside of their bedroom so that they can meet on this balcony.

Matt Whitaker : 41:03

Yeah So that's a mezzanine in the greenhouse. And yeah, the greenhouse will be, you know, a buffer.

Jo Bolton: 41:10

And it'll take a tree.

Matt Whitaker : 41:12

It'll have a lemon in it, a fig or some grapes.

Jo Bolton: 41:15

So it'll turn into some dwych tree, all of them, yes.

Matt Whitaker : 41:20

Olive tree in there. Yeah, you know that was part of the original visions. A little space to grow on.

Jo Bolton: 41:29

And that'll extend round to the porch, because the porch is so. You arrive into the house through our shed, which isn't the most attractive welcoming. So yeah, that and finishing the sort of wall around there. It's more exterior stuff though. Yeah, the bathroom, yeah, i mean, yeah, i mean each area. I forgot about the bathroom.

Matt Whitaker : 41:55

The bathroom first, but each area has been okay. This is a building in itself, you know. That's just because there's this huge curtain round the back. You know, part of it makes what we use as a bike shed, part of it makes the as we move around the back of the building on the north side. Part of it means it's a pantry. That's that door there behind us, and then part of it we couldn't use because the aquifer folded there And then we're back into what is our main entrance, the porch, which then joins onto the greenhouse. So there's this huge curtain which looked quite easy on the plans, but actually each one of those sections is a small building in itself. Yeah Yeah, optimism is a wonderful thing And you've got to start building with optimism haven't you.

Jeffrey Hart: 42:41

You wouldn't start if you didn't have it.

Matt Whitaker : 42:42

No, No, and I think, as a builder, that's probably your greatest gift. Is this blind optimism? You're going to create this thing and the job you have creating it is wonderful, but it's always a lot harder than I ever imagined it to be, but that's part of its beauty as well. No adventure without adversity is that, i feel.

Jo Bolton: 43:17

All right.

Jeffrey Hart: 43:30

Thank you, joe and Matt. So great to hear about your house while sat in it Such a beautiful space Really enjoyed my time in the Weeter Bix And just really really enjoyed getting to hang out with Joe and Matt. I get to see them at Greenwood working events But, yeah, to really get to know them and ask all the questions I wanted to ask was a really brilliant thing for me personally, and so I hope you all enjoyed it. At home There is links in the show notes minimal links this week really. That's Joe and Matt and Abundant Earth, and I'll put a link also to the book, the Barbara Jones Straw Bail book And also the Timber Framing book that Matt used for Timber Framing the building. I had a flick through it just after we finished recording And it's full of all details and joints And it is really better than any Timber Framing book I've ever seen. So I'm going to get myself a copy of that Maybe you want to do. If this was your first episode, then do subscribe, go back and check out all of the other episodes. There is a whole lot of interesting straw type stuff. Maybe you can check out the episode with Phil Christopher. He was talking about all things straw bale, particularly the project they did up in Hastings Visitors Centre. Quick reminder to share this episode. If you can really appreciated, if you are listening on Apple podcasts, then if you get just two minutes just to write a quick review, give it a five star rating. That really does help more people to find this podcast and also makes me really smug Patron. If you want to support this podcast financially, you can support it by sharing, but financially then do head to patreoncom forward slash building sustainability. You get about 10 hours of bonus content on there from various guests from the first 100 episodes And you get a little bit of waffle from me. You get to see around my house, things like that. I think that's everything. Thank you very much for listening. I hope you're really really well and I look forward to coming back with some more jats with nice people very, very soon. All right, catch you later.