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Natural Plastering Craftsmanship in Japan: 50 min. Documentary

By Resources, Video, Clay Plaster, Lime Plaster

 

Whenever you have a quiet evening, I highly recommend you check out this 50 minute documentary about plastering craftsmanship in Japan. I’m not sure when this was produced, but not anytime too recently. The production has that smooth, slow, gentle vibe that will whisk you away. You don’t need to understand Japanese to glean a lot of valuable information about the process and workflow of creating beautiful clay and lime walls. Much respect to the sakan. This is heavenly.

clay manure plaster finish: straw bale house

Essential Natural Plasters: My New Favorite Book for Plastering

By Resources, Clay Plaster, Lime Plaster

essential natural plasters book reviewThe world of natural plasters runs deep. Despite the seeming simplicity of plaster, there’s a lot of depth to explore. Materials, recipes, tools, and application can vary widely from project to project, person to person, and place to place. Although there are some good resources on the subject, there haven’t been a lot of in-depth publications focused on plastering in North America specifically.

Luckily, that’s changed with the release of Essential Natural Plasters. This is easily my new favorite resource for natural plaster recipes and techniques. The authors Michael Henry and Tina Therrien (and a host of contributors) shine a bright light on the sometimes mysterious subject of clay and lime finishes.

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benito: polished clay plaster

Polished Clay Plaster How-To Video

By Video, Clay Plaster, Resources

Did you know that you can polish clay plaster so that it has a reflective mirror finish? It looks spectacular, and Benito Steen (son of Athena and Bill Steen, straw bale experts of the southwest) has a new video describing his process for achieving the effect. Benito has done a great job describing the process in clear, simple term. The video is beautiful to watch, too.

Check it out above and learn for yourself how to make a polished clay plaster finish with very simple ingredients. Hope to see more videos like this soon!

insulation thermal mass

The Differences Between Insulation and Thermal Mass

By Winter, Straw Bale Building, Resources, Cob Building
trimming straw bale wall

A highly insulated straw bale home under construction

If you’re new to natural building, two of the most important fundamental concepts to understand are thermal mass and insulation. Materials for constructing walls typically fall into one category or the other. Understanding the differences will be critical if your goal is to build an efficient, comfortable house appropriate for your local climate. Let’s look at thermal mass and insulation in the simplest terms possible.

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Clay Plaster in Japan: Inspiring Video Documentary

By Video, Clay Plaster, Resources

https://youtu.be/8Bnjl6unKhw

I was excited to find this video documentary about Japanese clay plaster as it’s currently being practiced by sakan (a.k.a., traditional plasterers). From what I gather, clay plaster is a niche craft in Japan, but the tradition has been unbroken for hundreds and hundreds of years. It’s not practiced as widely as it once was, yet the quality of the work that is done is exceptional. It’s serious business, and absolutely beautiful and inspiring too.
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earthen floor

Introduction to Installing Earthen Floors

By Resources, Earthen Floor
installing an earthen floor

Installing the base layer of an earthen floor

Earthen floors are floors composed of compacted clay, sand, and straw. They are made flat and troweled smooth just like a concrete slab. However, the finished product is much softer on your feet… and on the earth itself. You can build an earthen floor with readily available materials. The labor input is quite high, but the material cost should be very low. And of course, the embodied energy is low, too — this is a very resilient, low tech method that can be incorporated in a variety of locales. Here’s a very short introduction and answers to common questions about earthen floors.

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Properties of clay plaster

How to Make and Apply Base Coat Clay Plaster

By Light Clay Straw, Resources, Clay Plaster, Straw Bale Building
Base coat clay plaster

A student floats a creamy layer of clay plaster during one of our workshops

In my recent series of posts, I’ve described the process for building and finishing a light clay straw wall. First there was mixing the light clay straw itself and stuffing it into wall cavities. Then I discussed how to prepare for plaster by making and installing wood trim, and coating the walls with a simple clay slip. Next I’ll describe how to make and apply a base coat (or scratch coat) clay plaster. Now it’s really getting fun.

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Preparing for Clay Plaster: Making and Installing Wood Trim

By Resources, Clay Plaster, Carpentry, Light Clay Straw, Doors & Windows

clay-plaster-floating-fiberglass-stucco-mesh-02

Light clay straw walls are a great surface for finishing using natural plasters. Because the straw-clay is tamped inside of a stud wall, you have a fairly flat surface to start with, compared to something like straw bale which needs a lot of trimming and often extra thick plaster to achieve an even surface.

Here I’ll give some tips and suggestions for how to prepare a light clay straw wall to receive clay plaster, using our recent outhouse project as our demonstration site. In this post, I’ll talk about how to make and install wood trim, which should be the first step in preparing your newly built wall to receive clay plaster.

There are a few tricks you’ll need to ensure a quality job. Read ahead for my method…

 

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Japanese Joinery, Animated

By Carpentry, Timber Framing, Design, Woodworking, Resources, Traditional Building, Video

 
 
Japanese craftspeople have the reputation of designing and creating some of the most intricate and complex timber joinery on the planet. The use of timbers in construction has a long and deeply fascinating history, and many of these astonishing joints have their roots in the building of temples. Historically, these techniques were fiercely guarded secrets of the carpentry guilds. (If you’re interested in Japanese joinery history and the current practice of temple restoration, check out the fascinating book The Genius of Japanese Carpentry.)

Check out this collection of beautifully simple animations of Japanese joinery in action. These are great little demonstrations of timber frame joints interlocking together.

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