Adobe
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Adobe (mud brick) has been used for centuries in the more arid areas of Europe and Africa and came to the US with the Spanish in the early 1500's and quickly spread as a preferred building material as it was inexpensive and readily available. Adobe is one of man's first building materials. The mass of the adobe walls will absorb heat and radiate it back out into the house at night. In the summer the converse is true. Thus the swing in temperature inside the house is very mild. For thousands of years adobe houses have represented the practical wisdom of people who learned how to use the materials at hand to build homes that fitted the climate and landscape in which they lived. Adobe making runs back to the time of Pharaoh who withheld from the children of Israel the straw for sun-baked bricks. Adobe construction also embodies strands of our southwestern history. When the Spaniards came to New Mexico they found the Indians using adobe, wood, and stone to house themselves. The Indians did not make bricks, but "puddled" the mud allowing each layer to dry before adding more. Adopting these materials the Spanish made moveable sun-baked bricks, formal fireplaces, and wooden doors. "Adobe" is a Spanish word derived from the Arabic "atob," which literally means sun-dried brick. The Spanish brought to the the Southwest the craft of forming the mud into blocks in wooden molds which is still used today.
David Peterson, http://www.davidcpeterson.com/gallery_two.htm, built this in Placitas, New Mexico and although it is the typical "Southwest Pueblo Style", it is modern in every respect. This not the typical DIY project.
In New Mexico adobe construction was the norm rather than the exception it is today. The high cost of labor and the move away from the farms and ranches has made adobe construction unaffordable except for the very wealthy.
Vigilant and watchful of the impact that building codes have on affordable construction methods, Joe Tibbets, http://www.adobebuilder.com/ , and the Adobe Builder Magazine provide updates and news letters.
Quentin Wilson, http://www.greenhomebuilding.com/adobe.htm#expert, teaches adobe construction at Northern New Mexico Community College and is involved in various projects in Northern New Mexico.
Links of Interest
New Mexico Adobe Code effective Nov 2005
http://www.nmcpr.state.nm.us/nmac/parts/title14/14.007.0004.pdf
Contact Information
- Telephone
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(505) 238-0426
- FAX
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(505) 867-2876
- Postal address
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PO Box 45741 Rio Rancho, NM 87174
- Electronic mail
Sales paul@sanco-bg.com
Web Master webmaster@sanco-bg.com
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