ALTERNATIVE CONSTRUCTION -- CONTEMPORARY NATURAL BUILDING METHODS.

Edited by Lynne Elizabeth and Cassandra Adams. Chichester: John Wiley. 2000. [pound]38.95

'In honouring the character of natural building materials, we can create joyful places with souls ... Through natural building, we can begin to make safe places within which our own hearts can open, join with others and flourish.'

The natural materials discussed in this American book are mostly earth-based adobe, cob, rammed earth. Light-clay and straw-bale are also included, and less common here at home, earthbag, earth-rammed tyres and bamboo. Interestingly, timber is excluded as it consumes trees and timber-framed buildings have poor thermal performance compared with adobe, straw-bale etc. Most of the examples are from the US, which, being a continent of vast climatic contrasts, are wide-ranging and allow, to a limited extent, comparison with elsewhere. The chapter on bamboo is interesting, and the amazing structures built by Simon Velez in Colombia surely deserve to be better known. There are discussions about the thermal performance of earth materials, and a full bibliography. There is no lack of practical information for those embarking on building with earth materials; photographs illustrate almost every page, but it's a pity there are not a few in colour considering how beautiful many of the buildings are.

Most of the construction techniques discussed are labour-intensive (part of the point, of course, from another perspective) and in the so-called 'developed' world we live in today, are unlikely to become mainstream.