Earthship Ironbank
12-27th April 2014
Taking place over 2 weeks and 2 weekends during the Easter holidays, 15 participants came along to give the Ironbank Earthship much needed work to ensure it was closed before winter time. Lead by Martin Freney, Rosa Henderson, Sean Bozkewycz, Sam and Jemma Tregenza, Rachel Goldlust and Jesse Thomas from the Canadian Living Solutions Group, the workshop undertook a range of activities, working daily through the school holiday period with extras coming along for both weekend sessions. A few returned participants came along from the extensive January workshop and to those people we send a big thanks for your continued work and help over the two weeks.
A full interior and exterior cement plaster was applied to the entry and west vault, with the insulative Hempcrete layer going on over the 4 days of Easter, with many exciting spontaneous problem solving happening to ensure its correct application in this tricky situation. The 2 internal greenhouse bottle walls and the external east and west bottle walls were completed, the entrance bottle wall being a designed pattern layed in cob to test its workability and has proven to be just as reliable as cement for such an application, though it is not the side of the building which gets the most weather.
The roofing was completed with the solar hot water system installed, the back water catchment built and tested for the coming winter, the grey water planter was lined and filled with all pipes in place for grey water treatment and overflow. The main vault room was given a near finish render of cob and the ceiling done with lime as was the interior greenhouse walls.
Along with Marty's problem solving sessions and explanatory talks to all newcomers we had a few evening videos on a range of sustainable living topics and all participants went home feeling inspired and with a new array of skills learnt over the two weeks. Further working bees will be run by Marty and family over coming months to ensure completion by September for Sustainable House Day. Contact Marty through earthshipironbank.com.au for details of future events.
Again a big thanks to Marty, Zoe and family for their endless generosity in having us live with them for weeks and all the amazing crew and participants who made this another enjoyable workshop and part of the range of opportunities Earthship Australia is pursuing to give people the opportunity to come and learn about building Earthships across Australia.
Earthship ironbank Workshop a success
Earthship
Ironbank workshop 1 was held in the beautiful Adelaide hills over the
summer with extreme weather and awesome times had by all. Over the
course of 5 weeks participants were engaged thoroughly in all hands on
aspects of Earthship building alongside a 10 strong crew of experienced
Earthship trainers from Australia, Germany and New Zealand. Leading the
project was Marty Freney, lecturer at the University of SA and an avid
do-er who managed to sift through the permit process in his local
council of Okaparinga and achieve the first permitted single vault
survival model Earthship in Australia!
Over 50 workshop participants came and enjoyed the workshop which provided for attendance for 1,2, or every week that the workshop was running with lists of key activities provided on the earthshipironbank.com.au page so people could come along and work on aspects they were interested in. Though the workshop was scheduled to run for 5 weeks, crew have stayed on for an additional 2 weeks to continue the project but as yet the structure is not completed and we will be providing details on a finishing workshop coming up in Easter 2014, stay tuned for that!
Thanks to Marty, Zoe and family and all the crew and amazing participants for all their hard work, grit and humour through a very challenging experience. We have all gained enormously from the workshop and will be continuing the great spirit of co-operation and respect which showed clearly throughout the experience.
We hope you all can come and visit Marty's Earthship Bed and Breakfast after it is unveiled in September, 2014 where you can experience a night or two or more in a real Earthship complete with grey and black water systems, passive solar greenhouse, water catchment and see the amazing creative work done with recycled and natural materials. Go to http://www.earthshipironbank.com.au/ for more information, photos and future workshop details.
Cheers!
Over 50 workshop participants came and enjoyed the workshop which provided for attendance for 1,2, or every week that the workshop was running with lists of key activities provided on the earthshipironbank.com.au page so people could come along and work on aspects they were interested in. Though the workshop was scheduled to run for 5 weeks, crew have stayed on for an additional 2 weeks to continue the project but as yet the structure is not completed and we will be providing details on a finishing workshop coming up in Easter 2014, stay tuned for that!
Thanks to Marty, Zoe and family and all the crew and amazing participants for all their hard work, grit and humour through a very challenging experience. We have all gained enormously from the workshop and will be continuing the great spirit of co-operation and respect which showed clearly throughout the experience.
We hope you all can come and visit Marty's Earthship Bed and Breakfast after it is unveiled in September, 2014 where you can experience a night or two or more in a real Earthship complete with grey and black water systems, passive solar greenhouse, water catchment and see the amazing creative work done with recycled and natural materials. Go to http://www.earthshipironbank.com.au/ for more information, photos and future workshop details.
Cheers!
