So, you want to know why we chose not to build an Earthship, huh?

Well, there are a couple of reasons.
The first and foremost reason is Lotte.

Lotte Middelkoop

Last year, in February, when I (Rogier) went on a volunteer week in Normandy to work on the Trotts Earthship we had every intention on building an Earthship. Little did we know.
Early the first morning a small car with two huge guys and a not so huge girl came driving up to the site. They had been driving all night from Holland. My first thought was that these had to be students and were completely mad. Turned out I was right, partly.

I got to know Lotte a little and since we lived not far apart she suggested to meet up back in Holland. We (Laila, Lotte and I) did, it clicked and the idea to have our house designed by her became solid, fast. Second time we went to Normandy together, Laila, Lotte and I. Everything we came up with was confirmed that week and plans were set in motion.

This summer Lotte is earning her degree as an architect, specialised in sustainability at the TU Delft. The design of our future home is her thesis.

Second reason.

Building Permits

The story goes that some lady opted for a building permit for an Earthship in Belgium. She though she got it and hired Mike Reynolds’ team to build the thing. But, at the last minute the permit was pulled and the Earthship could not be build. Instead they build a hut, a consolation.

Other stories of having troubles getting a permit circulate as well.
In order to get a building permit one has to write to every county or district they can (and we have a language challenge with that option), then hoping one agrees and then hoping they have a suitable site, and ultimately a site where you want to build a somewhat expensive house and want to live for a long time to come. That is a lot hopes and ifs.

We decided that location, location, location was to be the most important thing, especially if you want to live there for 20 or 30 years. So the above process was eliminated. And after seeing the conditions with which a building had to comply in Chenogne, our choice was confirmed.
So, now we’re designing a reasonably normal looking house, but build in a sustainable manner, and autonomous.

I also believe that at least 99.9% of everything that is being build in Holland (’cause that’s where we’re from) will never be an Earthship. Because of the building materials and, simply,  the way it looks. We are to conservative.
The fact that we have an Earthship teahouseis a very rare exception and I believe individuals will never get a permit for an Earthship in a residential area, in Holland.
The upper half of Belgium is quite similair, but the chances get better the farther down you get in Europe.

Third reason.

Recycling

One of the corner stones of the Earthship concept is reusing discarded materials. I don’t think one can call it recycling, because once it’s used in the building it cannot be used again (the bottles and cans are laid in concrete, so you can’t reuse them, and concrete is not particularly sustainable either). This as opposed to a closed recycle system where, for instance, bottles are bought, used, brought back, recycled, filled, bought et cetera.
In Western Europe, and especially in Holland, the recycling is pretty advanced. And by using these recyclable materials in a building one takes them out of the whole recycle process, never to be (re)used again. This means that for every glass bottle or aluminium can used in a building, one has to be made a new to be used in the consumer process.

Now, the above reason is only valid in a country where the process of recycling is well implemented. My guess is that by far the bigger part of the world, including the US, is far from having a nice and tight closed loop. So building Earthships is still a good idea, maybe even a necessity. Better to build a house with garbage than to throw it in a landfill.

And the fourth reason.

Design

After visiting an Earthship, help build one and volunteering in one we decided that the design just didn’t cut it for us. This now is a mute reason, because of the above statements. But, like the land you buy, the house you intend to live in for a long, long time needs to be, and feel, just right.

The concept of an Earthship seemed right at the time, but life always has a trick up its sleeve and throws you off balance when ever it can. When that happens you take stock, adjust and move on.

[english]Laila is been working on the first Earthship in Holland for the past week and the last time we were there (a month ago) they were still busy pounding tires. There was also work done on the systems which run under the floor.

Since then, another four weeks have past and so much work has been done. The roof is on, the framing for the windows is done and so much more. The Americans have been going at it, the Euro-team is been going at it and a bunch of volunteers have been helping out and learning about Earthships. Mike Reynolds (a.k.a. Mr. Mikey) has been tirelessly explaining his vision and enlightening journalists and visitors alike.

Laila is learning also. Next to doing stuff with her hands (glass cutting, cement mixing, mud throwing, building bottle walls and getting a few steelworkers to deliver an order withing 24 hours) she also was entrusted with guiding  the volunteers, she does speak Dutch.

From what I gathered fun was also an important factor. In the evening going out and eating food together in good spirit is what Earthship building is all about.

Laila has another week to go with the Euro-team. We had a little going away party last friday with the Americans, they’re gone now, back to the good ole States. The final stint of the build will be done by the Europeans, they have only three week left to finish. It’ll be tight…[/english]
[dutch]Laila is de afgelopen week druk bezig geweest in Zwolle, werkend aan het eerste Earthship in Nederland. De laatste keer dat ik er was, een maand geleden, waren ze nog druk bezig met banden rammen. Ook werd er al gewerkt aan de systemen die onder de grond lopen.

Sindsdien zijn er 4 weken voorbij en is er zeer veel gedaan. Het dak zit er op, de raamkozijnen zitten er in en zo veel meer. Het Amerikaanse team en het Europese zijn druk bezig geweest en vrijwilligers hielpen mee en hebben een hoop geleerd over Earthships. Mike Reynolds (a.k.a. Mr. Mikey) heeft met engelen geduld zijn visie verteld en de horizon van vrijwilligers en journalisten verbreedt.

Laila leert ook.., naast het fysieke werk (glas snijden, cement maken, modder gooien en staal buigen, dat laatste heeft ze dan laten doen) was ze mede belast met het begeleiden van de vrijwilligers.

Van wat ik heb begrepen is het in het algemeen “gezellig” geweest. Overdag lol hebben en ‘s avonds samen uit eten (en drinken) in goed gezelschap is zo tekenend voor het bouwen van een Earthship.

Laila heeft nog een week te gaan met het Euro-team. Vrijdagavond hadden we een klein vaarwel feestje voor de Amerikanen, zij zijn inmiddels terug naar de US. Het laatste stuk van de bouw wordt gedaan door de Europeanen en zij hebben nog 3 weken om het af te maken.., dat zal moeilijk worden…[/dutch]

This monday building on the Earthship Teahouse in Zwolle (The Netherlands) has begun in ernest.
Earthship Biotecture Europe has the lead on the build, but help from the US is also present.
Mike Reynolds will also be on site for a short time to give his expert advise.

Friends of mine are also working on the site, one is even part of the crew for the whole build. Laila is working on the build for two week in October.

Just a short story on another short adventure which this time took us to France. As you know we (still) are in the early stages of building an Earthship and one of the main ingredients of an Earthship is, as you can guess.., earth.
We need a piece earth.., actually that is the first thing we need before we can do anything else.

Find land, get permit, buy land, and build Earthship.., that’s the idea…

So we made a second run, this time we passed through Belgium and along the way decided that the Belgium Ardennes are no longer an option.., everything points to the French Ardennes. And it’s not just the feeling we get, although important, it’s also the money.., it’s just a very big difference.., about half… well something like that.

Then there is political stability, the French way of living, better roads, the countryside is more beautiful and we think we have more chance of actually obtaining a permit.

There’s a great deal of people moving away form the rural areas in search of better times, mostly to the cities. This means the smaller villages suffer and the locals welcome new arrivals, for obvious reasons. And that’s good for us…

We visited a couple of lots and about half was really interesting. Some villages really “feel” nice and we think we could easily make a home there. Of course there is a matter of cost, size and how reachable it is. We did find one lot which was really interesting. A bit pricy but the broker gave us some hope. Any real developments will be posted…

So, a bit about the Ardennes.

I know in Holland everybody knows “the Ardennes” and most of them have been there, or in that area at some time, mostly in the Belgium Ardennes, but hey…

One reason for its popularity is nature. The hilly structure of the area limits agricultural development and thus remains nicely forested.

The Ardennes has its own historical value with strong ties to both World Wars. The many monuments and remembrance statues are a constant reminder of these wars and the strategic value of the area.

Even the Netherlands have laid claim to the area in various times and under various flags, as Spanish Netherlands, the Austrian Netherlands and the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, eventually ending up with just a bit of wet lowland.

So in the traditions of old, we reclaim the Ardennes.., or at least a small part of it…

Source: Wikipedia

I wanted to share this with you. It’s a plausible design of Our Earthship. It is not perfected of course. This is just a way to visualize how we want to end up.

It is based on the Earthship build in France. The one we visited before. Advantages are that I have seen the Earthship and the plan is available on the internet. This is, of course, not set in stone. But it keeps one occupied.

The first time I visited the Trotts there happened to be a film crew from the French TV station M6. It was interesting to have a crew walking around with their fancy cameras and what not. But it was funny when they asked me if my car could be used for shooting. It is more adventurous than a regular car, which it indeed is. Watch the clip…

When I was hanging out at Kevan’s Earthship in Normandy he was talking about Olie and the Garbage Warrior movie. Having stories like that told in the first person you feel close to it real fast. Our passion for Earthships and the respect for Mike also contribute.

So we posted about the standing ovations for the movie.., now we post the trailer. You can see it after the break…O, and there’s also a small clip of Olie talking about the film.

Can’t wait to see the whole thing…

The Garbage Warrior DVD will be available to pre-order from 2nd April 2008 (US date).

[youtube]2KYJ0dsd-x0[/youtube]

[youtube]CrLg8Z5Mej0[/youtube]

In order to build an Earthship one has to find a piece of land first.., obviously.

Unfortunately that isn’t as easy as it sounds.., obviously. We found some interesting lots which could serve our purposes. Because the information we had was a bit thin we decided to go to Belgium and have a look.

The good news is that we have a better understanding of how large 3000 square meters really is, the bad news is, it’s going to be tough to find just the right piece of land.

The thing is that Earthship Biotecture claims you can build an Earthship anywhere in the world.., and you can. As long as it has a clear view to the south, not in a forest, not where the groundwater is close to the surface and there might be a few other criteria I do not know about.., yet.

So finding a piece of land is not as easy as it might be with a regular house.

As we were to find out…

The first lot we looked at turned out to be in a forrest, with big trees. Next to fact that it looked like a trailer park we could never get enough sunlight to heat up the house and generate enough power. Wind energy would also be a problem.

The second lot was bigger and greener, but this lay in a valley. And water ran on both sides of the lot with to the south a hill. Just big enought o prevent the winter sun from entering the house.

Here this story ends, but the quest continues. It will take some time to find a good spot. We learned a lot from this trip and will put it to good use.

The Earthship movie: “Garbage Warrior” screened last night at the Vancouver International Film Festival. The movie was viewed in an 800 seat theater that was filled to standing room only and received two standing ovations. One following the movie and the second following the question and answer session with Earthship Biotect Michael Reynolds.

read more | digg story

And so the Earthship community proves to be a good one.., again.

I visited the Earthship in Normandy last week. A request for help originated from the Trott family and resonated all the way through to silly old moi. And as Kevan is the European representative for Earthship Biotecture he is the man to meet. So, in a spur of the moment kind of way we decided that I (Rogier) should travel down to Normandy and check out this mystical thing called an Earthship.

I drove down on Monday, during the day and made good time. I even arrived a bit earlier than expected and visited the Earthship before heading of to Diane’s B&B (Cinq la Ruelle), which, by the way, turned out to be a most excellent choice.
Now, I have seen the Earthship before, I’ve read the blog and got a few books on the matter, so I knew what to expect.

But, seeing it for real does add an extra dimension to the experience. Obviously a lot is already done on the house, in fact, it’s nearly finished and thanks to the blog and fotos/dvd shown by Kevan one can get a good sense of the labor that went into creating it.

So, my primary objective was to make contact with Kevan and Gillian, the rest was secondary to that.
Now, it must be said that one has to be a little nuts to start a project like building an Earthship. Granted, it is a house, and people are building those all the time, but most of the time they pay somebody else to build it. And even if they do it themselves, building an Earthship has its own set of challenges. The building permit for one is in most cases the biggest hurdle (or mountain) to overcome. Then there are the resources (i.e. tires, bottles, cans). Of course, anything can be bought and delivered to your doorstep, but that kinda defeats the purpose of an Earthship.
Anyway, my point is that the Trotts are a bit nuts too, but in a good sense and not dissimilar to Laila and myself, which makes for a good foundation.

My time at the Earthship was spend working, on various little things, and talking. A lot of talking. Similar minded people make for good conversations on the various topics which mark an Earthship.., environmental, ecological, biological, sociological, monetary, and more…
Three students from Holland (Lotte, Joris and Niels) slept in a little tent and were interested from a scholar point of view, Steve (a Brit living in France) from a career point of view, Robert (also from Holland) from a personal point of view, like us, he wants to build his own Earthship.., somehow.., someday. Then there were two British guys, Will and Nick. Will having his own renovation company and Nick.., ehhh.., well Nick is just a very open minded man who’s motives remain a mystery…

Anyway…, it certainly was a worthwhile experience. I met nice people and had good conversations. The Earthship remains an enticing future. After visiting another one for real, it confirms the feelings we have since we first became aware of the concept.

We definitely want to build, and live in, our own Earthship.., we will make it happen…