Build classrooms, homes and community structures from local earth and bamboo — from soil testing to plasters and roofs.
Build durable, beautiful and climate-appropriate structures from the materials beneath your feet. This advanced course teaches the full craft of natural building — from testing your soil and making earth blocks, to raising monolithic cob and rammed-earth walls, working with bamboo, and finishing with breathable lime plasters. Every lesson is written for African climates and low-cost, low-energy construction, so you can build classrooms, homes, stores and community structures that are healthy, affordable and kind to the planet.
Across six modules you will move from principles to a complete build. You will learn how to read a site, choose the right technique for your soil and climate, protect earth walls from rain and rising damp, and design openings and roofs that keep a building standing for generations. Practical field tests and step-by-step methods are included throughout, so you can apply what you learn immediately.
6 modules · 22 lessons
The principles, materials and site thinking behind durable earth and bamboo construction.
Making, stabilising, curing and laying adobe bricks and compressed earth blocks.
Cob, rammed earth and wattle-and-daub — raising walls as a single, sculpted mass.
Selecting, treating and joining bamboo — and combining it with earth for framed structures.
The 'good boots and good hat' that keep earth buildings dry and standing for generations.
Structural design, climate-responsive choices, quality control and the journey from plan to completed build.
