Building Green: A Complete How-to Guide To Alternative Building Methods - Earth Plaster, Straw Bale, Cordwood, Cob, Living Roofs Paperback – January 28, 2006

I really would love to build a green house for my retirement. I am thinking about combining timber frame, straw bale and cob in an English/Irish cottage style with some more contemporary touches like french doors to a patio. I love the timber frame structure, it is so beautiful, the straw helps insulate in colder weather and keep it cooler in hot weather and with the proper orientation of the house and windows I can maximize the light and heat from the sun. I want the main living area to be open. I would like a good portion of the cottage to be the kitchen, dinning and family living area with the bedrooms and baths toward the back of the cottage. I want to use solar passive heat, solar pannels and wood stove heat in the kitchen for cooking and a woodstove in a fireplace in the main living area just for heat and beauty. The cob over the straw bales provides a good thermal mass to keep the temperture comfortable in all seasons. The cobb is also fireproof, insect proof, prevents allergies, or at least doesn't aggrevate them and the house built like this could with stand exteme weather, even earthquakes. The building materials are less expensive and these kind of cottages can last for hundreds of years and are beautiful to look at and live in. I love all the information this book contains. It is a useful reference book to learn more about green building styles. You can also use cob to build a pizza or bread oven and create inexpensive walls around your garden.

This book is a great read for anyone who wants to know more about four building techniques with demonstrable "green" or "sustainable" attributes. It strikes a good balance between theory and practice, as well as moving from concept through design to execution. Beautifully illustrated with copious photos, this thick and heavy book is a pleasure to either read from cover to cover as I did, skim or pick and choose what you want to explore in greater depth. The co-authors approach the material from somewhat different viewpoints – one a bit more starry-eyed than the other, but both of them accomplished builders with pragmatic concerns about how to build structures which shelter the body, inspire the mind, and sit as gently as possible on the planet. This is all done while administering just enough – but not too much – righteous political argument about how wasteful many other methods of building and construction are.You don't need to know much already about the subject material to get value from this book, as it is written clearly enough to convey basic concepts to complete beginners, while providing enough detail to satisfy more advanced readers. I look forward to sharing the book with my precocious twelve year-old nephew who is fascinated with 3D computer modeling and architecture, that is, *after* I'm done with it!

We build everything ourselves and pride ourselves on a truly green footprint, so bought this book for ideas about alternative building. This is a wonderful and comprehensive guide for anyone wanting to do-it-yourself in an Earth-friendly way. It has become our Bible for building--everything from our own house to the outbuildings for our chickens, goats and homestead tools.The book contains informative historical backgrounds for several building styles such as cob, strawbale, conventional stick framing, timeberframe, cordwood and so on, while giving real-life step-by-step instructions on how you can do it yourself. It also has sections on natural floors from dirt, stone, etc.; living roofs; drainage ideas; recycling bottles and other things as decoration, insulation and more. It is chock full of tips, and includes insightful perspectives on the things that worked well and those that did not.My copy of this book is well thumbed (I've read it through cover to cover several times and go back to it often). I really never get tired at looking at it and planning new projects. It is so inspiring!

This book is not a how-to, it is a very well illustrated treatise on the opportunities and limitations of several different building materials and methods. The authors take us through the construction process of a small cottage built with cob, straw bale, and cordwood.

If you are a builder or "newbee" to building and considering a book that shares good to great "how-to" perspectives on green technology, this is for you. One structure, from foundation to finished form, is discusses with a minimal over-view of the history and / or examples of other structures related to this small home.I have been reading, studying and participating in green building technology for about 7 years. I have an ever-growing library related to natural processes and green technology. This is one book I'd recommend to anyone interested in hands-on learning that's well presented. You'll want to keep this one.

haven't quite finished yet but i'm really enjoying reading this a lot. tons of really great photos, and it's very easy to understand for someone with limited building knowledge.my only complaint is the author does not know the difference between loose and lose :p

I love this book! They build a beautiful cottage and every single step is documented, photographed and explained without over complicating anything. You could literally build a very nice environmentally low impact home with only this book and some cash. The book is beautifully composed and mostly full of photographs and concise construction fundamentals. As a building nerd, this is one of the few books I recommend. My only disclaimer would be that they use the wrong type of media(soil) for the green roof that they installed on the cottage. I would use a 10% organic matter maximum mineral soil for a green roof and if you want to install one get a supplemental reference.