| Acknowledgments | p. xiii |
| Introduction | p. xv |
| What This Book Offers You | p. xvi |
| About the Authors | p. xvii |
| Questions & Answers about Cob | p. xviii |
| Philosophy, Background, and Design (What You Need to Consider Before You Start to Build) | p. 1 |
| Ianto's Story | p. 3 |
| Peasants and Farmers | p. 4 |
| The Importance of Housing Yourself | p. 5 |
| Natural Building | p. 7 |
| Learning from Nature | p. 8 |
| The Rise of Architects | p. 8 |
| Natural Laws | p. 9 |
| Learning from Conserver Cultures | p. 10 |
| What Are Natural Materials? | p. 14 |
| Unprocessed and Uncombined | p. 14 |
| Primary and Secondary Processing | p. 15 |
| Component Assemblies | p. 16 |
| Why Build With Earth and Other Natural Materials? | p. 16 |
| Health | p. 16 |
| Psychological Well-Being | p. 16 |
| Financial Empowerment | p. 17 |
| Comfort | p. 18 |
| Democracy and Empowerment | p. 18 |
| Tradition and Heritage | p. 19 |
| Durability | p. 19 |
| Environmental Impact | p. 19 |
| Steel Roofs in Kenya | p. 20 |
| The Natural Building Resurgence | p. 21 |
| Where's the Dumpster | p. 22 |
| Oregon Cob | p. 24 |
| A Brief History of Cob | p. 25 |
| Won't Burn Down, Bugs Can't Eat it, and It's Dirt Cheap | p. 26 |
| The Birth of Oregon Cob | p. 28 |
| Cookstoves As Inspiration | p. 29 |
| Our First Cob House | p. 30 |
| Characteristics of Oregon Cob | p. 33 |
| What Cob Does Best | p. 33 |
| Mass Cooler | p. 34 |
| Where Oregon Cob May Be Inappropriate | p. 36 |
| Cob in Hybrid Natural Buildings | p. 37 |
| Cob and Straw Bale Comparison Chart | p. 39 |
| Creative Economics | p. 40 |
| Building for Yourself | p. 40 |
| Thoreau on Shelter | p. 41 |
| Trading Money, Skill, and Time | p. 42 |
| Cheap Housing for Those Who Need It Most | p. 45 |
| Getting Free from the Trap | p. 46 |
| Finding Inexpensive Places to Build | p. 47 |
| Edward's Almost Free House | p. 47 |
| Borrowing Money | p. 48 |
| Checklist: How to Keep Costs Down | p. 49 |
| Interview: Brigitte and Elyse's House | p. 51 |
| Tilt and Spin | p. 54 |
| Watching Earth Turn | p. 55 |
| Some Cosmic Fundamentals | p. 56 |
| A Cosmic Quiz | p. 57 |
| Let Your Home Reflect Cosmic Awareness | p. 57 |
| The Site You Build On | p. 60 |
| Choosing a Suitable Property | p. 61 |
| Consider the Local Bioregion | p. 61 |
| Spend Time on the Land | p. 62 |
| Selecting the Precise Site | p. 63 |
| Create a Master Plan | p. 63 |
| Minimize Ecological Disruption | p. 64 |
| Consider Soils and Drainage | p. 65 |
| Determine the Microclimate | p. 65 |
| Look for a Far Horizon | p. 66 |
| Look for a Dominant Permanent Feature in the Landscape | p. 66 |
| Build on Slopes If Possible | p. 67 |
| Respect Your Neighbors | p. 68 |
| Taking Time | p. 68 |
| Testing Your Choice | p. 68 |
| Dealing with Problem Situations | p. 69 |
| Short of Sun | p. 69 |
| No Trees on Site | p. 70 |
| Noise | p. 70 |
| Invisible Architecture | p. 71 |
| Not Enough Privacy | p. 71 |
| Not a Site for a Cob Building | p. 72 |
| Interview: Eric Hoel's House | p. 73 |
| Designing with Cob | p. 76 |
| The Box Police | p. 76 |
| When the Materials Design the Home | p. 78 |
| A Currency of Pennies | p. 78 |
| Cob's Natural Geometries | p. 79 |
| For Your Edification | p. 80 |
| Thermal Mass | p. 80 |
| Essentials of Passive Solar Design | p. 81 |
| Heating and Cooling Your Building | p. 84 |
| Be Stingy with Glass, Unless Your Climate Is Mild | p. 85 |
| Natural Lighting | p. 86 |
| Catnap Research in a Cob Greenhouse | p. 86 |
| The Heart House | p. 87 |
| Redefining "House" | p. 93 |
| Intuitive Design | p. 93 |
| Dispense with Convention | p. 94 |
| Brainstorm a Lot | p. 94 |
| The Site Was There First! | p. 95 |
| Share Your Home with Nature | p. 95 |
| Keep It Small! | p. 96 |
| Places, Spaces, and Rooms | p. 96 |
| Curved Spaces Feel Bigger: The Case for Round Feet | p. 97 |
| Banish the Old Noun-Rooms | p. 100 |
| Act Out the Dance of Your Daily Life | p. 101 |
| Think Gloves Not Boxes | p. 103 |
| Your Workplace | p. 104 |
| Outdoor Rooms | p. 104 |
| Orient to Earth's Tilt and Spin | p. 106 |
| Make a Model | p. 107 |
| Make an Outline Plan | p. 109 |
| Adjusting the Time-Depth | p. 109 |
| "I Design Old Buildings" | p. 111 |
| Building the Cob Cottage | p. 113 |
| Michael's Story | p. 115 |
| Building a Cob Cottage Step-By-Step | p. 116 |
| Materials and Tools | p. 119 |
| Raw Materials and Where to Get Them | p. 119 |
| The Geological History of Your Site | p. 120 |
| Composition of Soils | p. 120 |
| Determining a Soil's Suitability | p. 122 |
| Sand | p. 123 |
| Clay | p. 124 |
| The Island Without Clay | p. 127 |
| Straw | p. 128 |
| How Much Raw Material Will I Need? | p. 130 |
| Numbers are Not Sizes | p. 131 |
| Finding Other Building Materials | p. 132 |
| Scavenging in the City | p. 133 |
| Scavenging in the Country | p. 134 |
| Tools | p. 134 |
| A Cobber's Tool Kit | p. 135 |
| Hand Tool Reflections | p. 137 |
| Site Respect and Preparation | p. 141 |
| Respect the Deep Ecology of the Site | p. 142 |
| Don't Clear Any Trees Yet | p. 143 |
| Work Slowly, Carefully, by Hand | p. 143 |
| Backhoe Madness in California | p. 145 |
| Work Out the Best Routes for Deliveries | p. 146 |
| Protect Sensitive Areas | p. 146 |
| Walk-in Buildings | p. 146 |
| Site Preparation | p. 147 |
| Dig Test Holes | p. 147 |
| Transfer Your Design onto the Ground | p. 148 |
| Build a Full-Scale Mock-up | p. 150 |
| Drive in Foundation and Datum Stakes | p. 151 |
| Finally, Begin Clearing the Site | p. 151 |
| Erect a Temporary or Permanent Roof | p. 152 |
| Interview: Site as Sanctuary | p. 152 |
| Drainage and Foundations | p. 155 |
| Site Drainage | p. 155 |
| Rubble Trenches | p. 156 |
| Other Drainage Techniques | p. 156 |
| Digging Trenches | p. 157 |
| The Importance of Good Drainage | p. 157 |
| Filling Trenches | p. 158 |
| Foundations | p. 159 |
| Building a Stone Stemwall | p. 161 |
| Experimental Foundations | p. 164 |
| Making the Best Cob | p. 166 |
| How Cob Was Mixed Historically | p. 166 |
| Preparing Clay Soils for Mixing | p. 167 |
| Testing Your Mix | p. 168 |
| The Snowball Test | p. 168 |
| The Crunch Test | p. 168 |
| Test Batches and Test Bricks | p. 169 |
| Mixing Cob on Tarps | p. 170 |
| Notes on Tarps | p. 173 |
| The Pit Method | p. 174 |
| Using Machines for Mixing | p. 175 |
| Mud, Labor, Pleasure | p. 176 |
| Tips for Speed and Efficiency | p. 177 |
| Cob Mix Trouble-Shooting Guide | p. 178 |
| Custom Mixes | p. 178 |
| Building Cob Walls | p. 180 |
| Cobs, Gobs, and Blobs | p. 180 |
| Trodden Cob | p. 182 |
| Cob Loaves | p. 182 |
| Gaab-cob | p. 183 |
| Creating a Monolithic Structure | p. 184 |
| Connecting Two Cob Walls | p. 185 |
| Three Contagious Conditions | p. 186 |
| Wall Thickness | p. 186 |
| Drying | p. 187 |
| Settling | p. 189 |
| Getting It Straight | p. 190 |
| Tapering Walls | p. 191 |
| Trimming Off Excess | p. 191 |
| Tools for Trimming | p. 192 |
| Pipes and Wires | p. 193 |
| Incorporating Other Materials | p. 193 |
| Reaching Higher | p. 194 |
| Scaffolding | p. 195 |
| Second Stories and Up | p. 195 |
| How Fast Can I Build? | p. 195 |
| Sculpting with Cob | p. 197 |
| Sculpting a Whole House | p. 198 |
| Remodeling | p. 199 |
| Built-in Furniture | p. 200 |
| Corbelled Shelves, Arches, and Niches | p. 200 |
| Starter Projects: Garden Benches and Walls | p. 203 |
| Learning and Growing with Garden Walls | p. 204 |
| Earth and Fire: Cob Hearths | p. 206 |
| A Heated Cob Bench | p. 206 |
| Rumford Fireplaces | p. 207 |
| A Lorena Cooking Stove | p. 208 |
| An Earthen Bread Oven | p. 209 |
| Mass Heating Stoves | p. 211 |
| Windows and Doors | p. 212 |
| Keeping the Wall Strong above Openings | p. 212 |
| Connecting Cob to Door and Window Frames | p. 214 |
| Installing Nonopening Windows | p. 216 |
| Replacing Broken Windows | p. 218 |
| Window Placement | p. 219 |
| Windows for Magical Light | p. 219 |
| Windows for View | p. 220 |
| Windows and Solar Gain | p. 221 |
| Windows vs. Ventilators | p. 222 |
| Doors and Doorways | p. 223 |
| Half-Doors | p. 225 |
| Roofs for Cob | p. 227 |
| The Parts of a Roof | p. 228 |
| Roof Design | p. 229 |
| The Shape of a Roof | p. 230 |
| Building a Roof Structure | p. 232 |
| Ceilings | p. 234 |
| Roof Sheathing | p. 235 |
| Living Roofs | p. 235 |
| Thatch | p. 238 |
| Metal Roofing | p. 240 |
| Tiles, Shakes, and Shingles | p. 240 |
| Roof Insulation | p. 242 |
| Wool | p. 243 |
| Straw and Straw-Clay | p. 244 |
| Natural Floors | p. 246 |
| Mass Floors | p. 247 |
| Preparation for a Mass Floor | p. 247 |
| Poured Adobe Floors | p. 249 |
| Tamped Cob Floors | p. 252 |
| An Adobe Block Floor | p. 252 |
| Oil and Wax Finish | p. 253 |
| Other Materials | p. 253 |
| Hydronics and Hypocausts | p. 254 |
| Suspended Floors | p. 255 |
| Plasters and Finishes | p. 257 |
| Exterior Stuccos | p. 258 |
| Don't Use Cement Stucco | p. 259 |
| Interior Plaster | p. 260 |
| Materials for Stuccos and Plasters | p. 260 |
| Inner Light | p. 261 |
| Tools for Plastering and Mixing | p. 262 |
| Preparing a Wall for Stucco or Plaster | p. 263 |
| Earth Plasters | p. 264 |
| General Tips for Plastering | p. 265 |
| One-Coat Kaolin Plaster | p. 266 |
| Litema Clay-Dung Plasters | p. 267 |
| Gypsum | p. 268 |
| Lime-Sand Plasters | p. 269 |
| Washes and Paints | p. 271 |
| Limewash or Whitewash | p. 271 |
| Alis | p. 272 |
| Other Natural Paints | p. 272 |
| Water-Resistant Finishes | p. 274 |
| Onword: Bridging the Inner and Outer Worlds | p. 275 |
| Linda's Story | p. 277 |
| Sculpting Sacred Spaces for Well-Being | p. 279 |
| Intuitive Design and Magic Spots | p. 280 |
| Intuitive Design Exercise | p. 283 |
| Writing in a Magic Spot | p. 284 |
| Make a Model | p. 284 |
| Cob and Health--They Belong Together | p. 285 |
| Mud Dancing | p. 286 |
| Cobbers' Stories about Delight and Quality of Life | p. 288 |
| Joan | p. 288 |
| Mike | p. 289 |
| Elisheva | p. 289 |
| Tricia | p. 290 |
| Relationships and Cob Love Stories | p. 291 |
| A Match Made in Mud: Misha and Elisheva Rauchwerger | p. 291 |
| Earth, Ovens, Art | p. 292 |
| A Mud Artist Soulmate | p. 293 |
| Appendices | p. 295 |
| Common Errors in Cob Construction | p. 295 |
| Codes and Permits | p. 298 |
| Cob and Water | p. 304 |
| Cob and Earthquakes | p. 311 |
| Research Needed | p. 315 |
| Wildlife in the Home | p. 319 |
| Teaching and Learning | p. 323 |
| Glossary | p. 330 |
| Resources on Cob and Natural Building | p. 334 |
| Recommended Books | p. 337 |
| Index | p. 341 |
| Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved. |