Мы строим деревню / we are building ecovillage: наш дом

Our House: intuitively-nonproject building

Yanne 09.02.14 в 06:43

The idea came to me all at once, as is usually the case.

Yanne 22.02.14 в 16:35

I just hear a faint ‘click’, and there it is.

Yanne 22.02.14 в 16:36

Given a Moomin and a place,

Yanne 22.02.14 в 16:36

and there must follow a house.

Yanne 22.02.14 в 16:36

I was going to build a house with my own hands, a house exclusively my own!

Yanne 22.02.14 в 16:37

Tove Jansson

Yanne 22.02.14 в 16:33

I already wrote that I am not a construction worker and before my life in ecovillage I hadn't lifted anything
heavier than a receiver and hadn't built anything. Only here in Altai I got to know this field of human labour.

HypnoToad 3.01.14 в 2:33

I have already wrote...than a telephone receiver....had built nothing.

Yanne 24.04.14 в 16:00

I considered building my own house for the first time when several years ago I read book «House of adobe: philosophy and practice»(for more details about the books which inspire me see above). After reading it I started sharing the idea of building my own adobe house with my friends. As a response I had a lot of jokes like: «Ivanov wants to build a house of crap» or like «all this is just a fairytale, to build a house you need several million rubles and a crew of workers».

HypnoToad 3.01.14 в 2:46

−The first time the thought about my own house crossed my mind when several years ago I read the book «The Hand Sculpted House, A Practical and Philosophical Guide to Building a Cob Cottage» ...

Yanne 24.04.14 в 16:01

So, that's why I stopped sharing ideas on that with my friends. I just started gathering
information about subsistence farming. I also started gathering information about those who build houses for themselves
without being professionals or rich people.

HypnoToad 3.01.14 в 2:50

−...about subsistence building. ...about those who builds...

Yanne 24.04.14 в 16:01

As a result by spring 2012 me and Natalya had had more or less clear project of a house.
To speak more precisely, it was not a project itself but it was understanding of the idea of our house.
Key concepts. Back then we didn't have any experience and we didn't know how exactly we were going to
fulfill our idea.

HypnoToad 3.01.14 в 2:55
−...I and Natalya had more or less...Becouse then we didn't ...

Yanne 24.04.14 в 16:01

It may be said that our house is an conceptual and architectonic mixture of Wrench's house in Great Britain and house of Evgeniy Shirokov in the Republic of Belarus plus the impact of our reality of our nature and also the materials which we had or didn't have.

HypnoToad 3.01.14 в 3:05

−...and the house of Evgeniy Shirokov... plus the impact of local realiae, our charecter and the presence or absence of one or another material.

Yanne 24.04.14 в 16:02

We took the form as the basis. We were bent on the idea that our house should have the foundation similar to the round.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 07:34

The second question which was decided by us was about the isolation material. We chose the straw.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 07:39

The third element was the roof. We thought: “It will be good if our house has alive turfy roof”.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 07:41

Our building is based on these three pillars. The rest problems are solved in the process, in on-line mode. That’s why our building got the status of ‘’intuitively-nonproject’’ one.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 07:48

Probably this way of a building beginning is not very correct one. It’s more expensive and more nervous from some points of view, maybe it has more risks than the building with definite project and plan. But now I understand that it is the only right variant for us. We become to be too creative, inconsistent and immethodical to build our house in some other way.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 08:03

I haven`t told you about one more expect - about the choosing of the house place. It emerged that this process is not simple. There are almost no questions when you have three hundred square meters, but it is absolutely different if you tried to find your place on 100 hectares. This is a serious work. Before we started the building we changed around six places. The first place I liked at first, but then it stopped being good in itself. I pitched a tent on the second place, but was not manage to spend a night there, I can’t explain why. Then I picked out another place but it became too close to the settlement public buildings and we decided to move aside. Then we determined more or less our territory but the house traveled along it several times. The first position emerged to be too far from water, the second one was too dark in winter…

Yanne 09.02.14 в 08:27

In short, the place was chosen. Now I can put my name to the words from the book about the cob mentioned above, that before you start to build you should spend at least one year on the settlement territory and understand perfectly how and what occurs on this land through all seasons.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 08:36

Probably the place which appeared to be good in summer in spring will be flooded or something else will happen that can make this place to be inconvenient for the life. Thank God before the building we examined our territory well, and although we can’t say for sure, now I`m quite confident about the choice of the place.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 09:32

The next step was the materials delivery to the place of building. It also emerged to be an independent adventure.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 09:42

Firstly, I didn’t know exactly what and how many materials I need (there are the charm of nonproject building);

Yanne 09.02.14 в 09:47

secondly, the last kilometer of the road to our settlement is of bad quality and not all deliveries can reach us;

Yanne 09.02.14 в 09:50

Thirdly, some materials were not so simple to get: for example we can’t get an ordinary clay for some weeks because of bad weather. Due to it the walls construction came to a standstill for a long time.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 09:55

What I want to realize in our house are:

Yanne 09.02.14 в 09:56

1. The maximum of the naturality and material safety. The refusal from toxic substances and cement. (I even have a joke, which is not a joke already, but the truth: “We can eat our house”).

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:04

2. The correct windows disposition: the highest possible usage of sunlight for lighting.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:07

3. The house disposition and form should be in harmony with the surrounding landscape.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:08

4. The house must be warm and the comfort temperature should be maintained there with a help of minimum of recourses.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:13

About the estimate:

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:13

Unfortunately we have not taken strict stock of means, which were spent on the building. That’s why I can’t tell the strict price of our house.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:20

It must be admitted that firstly I didn’t take into consideration that in the estimate should be noted many other factors like: food for workers, price of the instruments, high price of materials delivery. What’s more, I didn’t think that for building you must have so much nails, bolts and screws of various types. And they are amazingly expensive!

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:36

Approximately, today we can declare the sum which was used for the building: it’s about 100.000 rubles. And we expect to spend about 50.000 more. It’s not cheap. This sum is three times more than that one in the first romantic estimate. But on the other hand I know people who buy a fur coat for 100.000 rubles. So in comparison with the fur coat our house is just free of charge.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:36

Building of a house turns out to be not so simple …

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:49

... physically.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:49

... emotionally.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:50

... intellectually.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:51

...financially.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:51

But it is realizable and very important. I recommend it to everybody.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:48

For the moment of the creation of this text we had built the house frame, made a roof, stored up all the materials, which were needed for the building, warmed the part of one wall. I’ll write about the house in details when we’ll finish it, but now there is nothing more to write about.

Yanne 09.02.14 в 10:56