Adapting to Climate by Being a Nomad within your own House

March 18, 2014 by kris de decker Filed Under: Air conditioning, Architecture, Low-tech living, Low-tech solutions, Random

While some people seasonally move between dwellings, others are nomads within their own houses. In such diverse places as Iraq, Algeria, and India, climates and cultures may vary, as do the directions and rhythms of movement. But all share migration within the dwelling as a primary mode of adaption to climate.

Families living in traditional courtyard houses of Baghdad, without mechanical ventilation or heating, migrate by day and season for comfort. In September or October, they move around the courtyard to rooms facing south. In April or May they shift to the north-facing rooms. In summer there is a daily vertical migration, the afternoon siesta being spent at the lowest levels and the nighttime sleep traditionally being taken on the roof under the stars.

old baghdad house

Picture: muhammadshnait91.tumblr.com

Such migrations mean that space is used with a freedom unusual in modern life and in the West. Recent correspondence from Mounjia Abdeltif-Benchaabane, a professor of architecture in Algiers, describes how rooms there have not traditionally been organized with regard to individual use or established purpose:

A living room becomes a sleeping room at night. Closets are full of mobile furnishings. In the morning everything is hung near windows to air out under the sun before being reused, perhaps in a different room. The kitchen is a multifunctional space. They cook on the floor even if they have modern tools.

A long-established Arab concern with privacy, in conjunction with the custom of migrating through the house, established the texture of some old cities like Baghdad. Since the roof is used for sleeping during nearly half of the year and the privacy of the family at night is fundamental, no house could look down upon its neighbor nor could one house look into the courtyard of another. The result was an effective building height control with advantages for solar access: no house could overshadow another, thus assuring wintertime light and heat to upper living spaces.

Quoted from “Ritual House: Drawing on Nature’s Rhythms for Architecture and Urban Design“, Ralph L. Knowles, 2006.

Decorated Mud Houses in Burkina Faso

October 7, 2013 by kris de decker Filed Under: Africa, Architecture

decorated mud house 2

“In the south of Burkina Faso, a landlocked country in west Africa, near the border with Ghana lies a small, circular village of about 1.2 hectares, called Tiébélé. This is home of the Kassena people, one of the oldest ethnic groups that had settled in the territory of Burkina Faso in the 15th century. Tiébélé is known for their amazing traditional Gourounsi architecture and elaborately decorated walls of their homes.”

“Burkina Faso is a poor country, even by West African standards, and possibly the poorest in the world. But they are culturally rich, and decorating the walls of their buildings is an important part of their cultural legacy in this area of the country. Wall decorating is always a community project done by the women and it’s a very ancient practice that dates from the sixteenth century AD.”

Read more: Decorated Mud Houses of Tiébélé, Burkina Faso. Picture (and many more pictures): Rita Willaert.

A Passively Cooled House in the Tropics

September 22, 2013 by kris de decker Filed Under: Architecture, Cooling, Random, Solar

passive house tropics

Build-It-Solar blog writes:

Kotaro Nishiki built a passively cooled home in Leyte Philippines at 11 degs north latitude that incorporates a number of unique cooling features that allow the home to be cooled passively and without electricity…

In this area, most homes are constructed of concrete, and the concrete structures tend to absorb solar heat during the daytime, and then retain that heat through the night making the homes uncomfortable.

Kotaro’s design is centered on eliminating these daytime solar gains. He keeps the whole house shaded using these techniques:

  • The south facing single slope roof has on overhang on the south that keeps the south wall in shade most of the day.
  • The north side of the house is shaded by an roof extension sloped down to the north that shades the north side of the house most of the day.
  • The roof is double layered with airflow between the well spaced layers.  This greatly reduces solar heat gain through the roof.
  • The east and west walls of the house are double wall construction with a couple feet between the walls.  The shading that the outer wall offers plus airflow between the double walls keep the wall temperatures low.
  • In addition, he has worked out ways to take advantage of the night
    temperature drop and to use thermal mass on the basement to provide some
    cooling.

More: A unique, passively cooled home in the Tropics (Build-It-Solar), Passive Solar House in Tropical Areas (Kotaro Nishiki). Build-It-Solar has more examples of passively cooled houses.

Seaweed Houses

August 8, 2013 by kris de decker Filed Under: Architecture, Random

seaweed house detail“Seaweed pillows were used as cladding for this holiday house on the Danish island of Læsø by architecture studio Vandkunsten and non-profit organisation Realdania Byg. The Modern Seaweed House revisits the traditional construction method in Læsø, where for many centuries trees were scarce but seaweed has always been abundant on the beaches. At one stage there were hundreds of seaweed-clad houses on the island but now only around 20 remain, which prompted Realdania Byg to initiate a preservation project.”

“The team enlisted Vandkunsten to design a new house that combines the traditional material with twenty-first century construction techniques. Seaweed is at the same time very old and very ‘just-in-time’, because it is in many ways the ultimate sustainable material, Realdania Byg’s Jørgen Søndermark told Dezeen. It reproduces itself every year in the sea, it comes ashore without any effort from humans, and it is dried on nearby fields by sun and wind. It insulates just as well as mineral insulation, it is non-toxic and fireproof, and it has an expected life of more than 150 years.”

See and read more at Dezeen. Via Lloyd Alter.

Shelters, Shacks, and Shanties

March 29, 2013 by kris de decker Filed Under: Architecture, DIY, Random

shelters shacks shanties“Shelters, Shacks, and Shanties presents lively, step-by-step tutelage
on building all types of temporary and long-term accommodations from both natural and man-made materials. Published in 1914, this practical classic is as essential a guide for today’s modern homesteader as it was at the turn of the twentieth century.

Included are instructions for dozens of worry-free shelters for you to chose from, including a sod house for the lawn, a treetop house, over-water camps, a bog ken, and much more. Satisfying the builder’s need for the creature comforts of home, it also provides tips on how to build hearths and chimneys, notched log ladders, and even how to rig a front door with a secret lock. Illustrated throughout with a bounty of helpful line drawings, Shelters, Shacks, and Shanties harkens back to the can-do spirit of the American frontier that still thrives today.”

Shelters, Shacks, and Shanties; and how to build them“, D.C. Beard, 1914 (Gutenberg free e-book). The description is from the 2008 edition (Amazon). Thanks to Thurston.

Nubian Vaults

March 5, 2013 by kris de decker Filed Under: Architecture, Random

nubian vaults

“The Nubian Vault technique is an age-old method of timberless vault construction, originating in upper Egypt. It uses only earth bricks and earth mortar. Nubian vaults built over 3,000 years ago at the Ramesseum mortuary temple, Luxor, are still standing. During the last ten years, Association La Voûte Nubienne (AVN) has successfully introduced a simplified, standardised version of this ancient technique in Burkina Faso, Mali, Senegal, and Zambia. This standardised technique is:

  • Ecologically sustainable – no corrugated iron roofing sheets, nor timber beams, rafters, or supports;
  • Carbon neutral – none of the construction materials are manufactured, or transported long distances, nor do any trees need to be cut down;
  • Economically viable – only locally available raw materials (earth, rocks, and water) are used, favouring local economic circuits and self-sufficiency;
  • Comfortable – due to the excellent thermal and acoustic insulation properties of earth construction;
  • Durable – NV buildings have a far longer lifetime than those with corrugated iron and timber roofs, and maintenance is simple;
  • Modular – applicable to a wide range of buildings (houses, schools, healthcentres…), of different styles (flat terrace roofs, two-storey buildings, courtyard buildings…), which are easily extendable;
  • Vernacular – incorporating tradtional practices and aesthetics of earth architecture.

The major cost element in using the Nubian Vault method is labour, often provided by family members and neighbours on an exchange / barter / self-build basis, thus keeping cash in the local economy; the raw materials (earth, rocks, water) are locally available and ecologically sound; construction with mud bricks and mortar is traditional in the Sahel region – the innovation of vault construction can easily be incorporated into existing practice.”

More information, including building guidelines and house plans, at “La Voûte Nubienne” (website in English and French).

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