Eco-Friendly Hobbit House

Geri Boyle

Came upon this earlier and thought it is quite relevant to this forum...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2039719/Simon-Dale-How-I-built-hobbit-house-Wales-just-3-000.html

Fed up with huge mortgage payments, Simon Dale decided to take matters into his own hands – literally.

Armed with only a chisel, a chainsaw and a hammer, the 32-year-old moved his family to a hillside in Wales and started digging.

The result is a wooden eco-home – constructed in four months and costing just £3,000 – which would look perfectly at ease alongside the Hobbit houses in The Lord Of The Rings.

This man is my idol of the day

Mech1

Simply "brilliant, well done that man"

Sticky_Fingers

Very nice, good luck getting planning permission for anything like that over here though (did he even get planning permission I wonder?).

In a similar vein here's a house made out of two 30' shipping containers stuck together that I found on a different forum. I'm not a big fan of the interior decoration, too many deer heads staring down at you but it seems extremely clever and well built. I read that in total it cost yer man $35,000 dollars to build so it was relatively cheap.

Corsendonk

Story reminded me of the of the Troglodyte Cave houses of France. The ancient christians also lived in caves in Turkey. Does anyone live in a
cave house in Ireland?

showcaves.com

the area near Saumur called Anjou, along the Loire river, huge layers of soft sandstone, tufa, and limestone are found, It is rather easy to carve out holes, houses and whole cities. Several small caves were formed by the Loire and have already been used by prehistoric man. But most of caves found today are artificial, the oldest of these "caves" were originaly quarries. The people needed the stones to build houses, churches and monuments. They often followed the layers of a specific stone, so after some time, the open quarry became a sort of mine, a subterranean quarry. Sometimes, the people used those quarries later for other purposes, like cellars, storage rooms or houses.
Cave houses have several advantages to other houses: they are cheaper, warm in winter, cool in summer. When a cave is built for living, the stone can be sold to reduce the cost. In central Europe they have a temperature of about 10°:C, which is rather cool, but may be easier to heat in winter than houses with thin and not isolated walls. Most cave houses in this area are also a matter of culture, it was common to build cave houses, so maybe nobody really thought about an alternative.
There are two importants kinds of rock in the area, le tuffeau (tufa) which was formed by the deposition of limestone from limestone rich water. It is rather young, porous and soft, at least while underground and humid. Cut into blocks it becomes dry and hard, light and a good insulator. This is an ideal rock for building houses. The second rock is le falun (shelly sand), a limestone rich in shells which was deposited about 12 Million years ago. It is found more or less only around Doué la Fontaine.
Most tourists know the area along the Loire river for its Renaissance castles, the Loire châteaux. Most of those castles were built during the 17th century during the reign of Louis XIV.. The construction of so many castles created an urgent demand for stones. This made the quarries profitable and increased the tufa and falun quarrying. The area is also a wine-growing region called the Touraine. Wines from this region are generally of high quality and elegance. Many former quarries were converted into wine cellars during the centuries.

Grizzly 45

TBH It would be very bad form and pretty hyprocritial of any county planning office to start refusing pp on buildings that are eco friendly made of recycled stuff and designed and blend into the scenery rather than stand out.
But of course this is Ireland,where one thing is said officaly and another is done practically.:(

Sticky_Fingers

Grizzly 45 wrote: »

TBH It would be very bad form and pretty hyprocritial of any county planning office to start refusing pp on buildings that are eco friendly made of recycled stuff and designed and blend into the scenery rather than stand out.
But of course this is Ireland,where one thing is said officaly and another is done practically.:(

Agreed but many planning authorities are populated by folks who will make you jump through hoops to get anything approved that varies from charmless concrete box model that has recently infested the Irish countryside.

Rinker

This guy was on Sean Moncrief on Newstalk last week. I'm nearly sure he said that he didn't need planning permission as it was a temporary structure. You wouldn't need planning permission for a similar structure in a woods in Ireland as long as you weren't connecting to an electricity or sewerage supply.

Misty Moon

Here are a few more in the same vein. Love the idea of (at least partial) underground housing.

That Roundhouse

$50 and up underground house

Grizzly 45

I hjave the 50$ and up underground house book.Might work Stateside,here I'd reckon it would cost abit more to do .Not to mind finding a dry enough site might be intresting too.

ElleEm

That Simon Dale house is beautiful. Would you be able to build a house like that for a similar price here? Minus the site price.
Just wondering could you get the materials as cheap and stuff.
It would be my dream home...

cards

I am interested in getting some kind of alternative dwelling built.Its a very rural location with a house that can't be lived in and was just thinking something simple to get away from it all on that site.Had considered cheap log cabin but not sure of quality.Any suggestions on how to find craftspeople to create something or any other ideas?Can spend 10-15k but less would be better!

Fiskar

Why not one of these? Seen them on escape to the country. 9 M diameter with stove in the middle, seems perfect to me for pure survival and works for our friends in mongolia. Appearantly people are queing up to holiday in them in Wales!

http://www.woodlandyurts.co.uk/Woodland_Yurts/yurt_holidays.html

http://www.theyurtfarm.co.uk/yurts.html