Here’s a little update showing what I’m working on today here at Cobville. I am plastering a cobin built about 20 years ago and explaining the earthen plaster I’m doing over wood. Again, if the wood is smooth, you’ll need to wrap it up with either flower paste with course sand added or primer with course sand added or something I’ve been using recently is something called methyl cellulose I get from Gold hill Clay plaster which works very similar to flour paste. You can also staple a chicken wire or hardware cloth to the wood, but that’s not very fun but it does work. Fortunately, in this case, the wood was rough enough that a Clay slip was all that was needed for the Cob to grab onto the wood. When this is dry, I’ll be doing a clay paint over everything which will consist of equal parts nice colored Red, Clay, very fine silica sand and the Methyl cellulose. I might add a little bit of Mica in it also to make it sparkle. It’s also impossible to do a lime blaster over everything as well followed by a lime wash, but to be honest with you I so prefer doing earthen plasters and if it’s applied, smooth enough and burnished well it does handle water pretty well

Greetings lords and ladies of the cobdom, I’ve just acquired a forest realm in Mexico, which will be the site for our cob dreams to come true. Have very little experience but excited to learn and am grateful to have this community resource to help me. Have been thinking about this for months so I have so many small and big questions such as what local wood am I going to use, how is my soil gonna be for cob, can I make my own stained glass windows without lead or solder, how much should I clear the forest around the cobins… The plan is to eventually have over 10 Cobins! And offer this place as a healing sanctuary to others. The building restrictions are way more relaxed here compared to the US and Europe so that’s helpful. Would love to hear from others what they’re planning/creating, no matter how small or big? Wish I could make this hobbit workshop as I’m close very close to Guatemala, hoping the hobbit house eventually becomes an online course. Good look on your adventures!

Hey Y’all, just thought I’d share with you this little video of the pallet Cob classroom I worked on in Florida. You can see how we built it on a deck rather than on the ground in order to keep all the insects and wildlife around intact.

Here’s a little video showing how I make a clay paint to go over a cob wall. It’s a mixture of equal parts, flour paste or methyl cellulose which I get from Gold hill Clay plaster, very fine 70 grit sand and sifted Clay from on site. I added a little bit of Mica to give it a sparkle and a little bit of a Gold hill clay plaster as well to give it a lighter color. I paint this on pretty thick and then use a yogurt lid to smooth it out. This will give it a nice color and help to shed water off the wall. If the structure has a big enough overhang, this could be applied on the outside of a cobin as well as the inside. It can also be sealed with linseed oil and some sort of thinner like mineral spirits to ensure that it will be waterproof.

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82866744784?pwd=ZblrdlcuIFVwbQaXQwjKfIGMPXWZun.1