03 ADOBE SKYTHERM HOME

'Adobe' is a word commonly used to describe employing earth as a building material in places such Mexico, Southwest USA, and Spain, so compressed stabilised earth (CSE) material is used to build the walls of this house.

Earth is one of the cheapest and most  abundant building materials on the planet. It provides excellent heat insulation, making adobe buildings cooler in the summer and hotter in the winter than buildings made of steel and concrete. Structurally speaking, earth is difficult to squash, and thus makes good walls.

The alternative material for building walls of this eco-house is Pumice-crete, a low density concrete made from pumice aggregate, portland cement, and water, The walls are very durable,
fireproof, possess fine soundproofing qualities, and are very aesthetically pleasing because they can be formed to suit a vatiety of architectural forms and styles.

Skytherm® Roof Pond, patented by architect Harold Hay in the '60s, has been incorporated in the design. The roof is made of water bags covered with movable insulating panels. During the winter season, the panels should be left open during the day to allow sun's heat to be absorbed and transferred into the house; at night, the panels are closed to conserve the heat. In the summer this process is reversed to close the panels during the day, thus insulating the water bags from the sun's heat and allowing heat to be drawn from the inside, whilst at night such would be left open to allow the water's heat radiation to the night sky above. The panels are rolled either manually or mechanically, using a 1/4hp reversible motor.

The rather unorthodox building form of this eco-house can easily be derived thanks to the plasticity of earth as a highly mouldable material, as well as the principles of Organic Architectural form, which incorporates no straight lines, angles nor symmetry - as no such can be found in nature. This implies that buildings should also be shaped accordingly. The aerodynamic walls also provide minimum resistance to strong winds and sandstorms, often found in Hot Dry climates for which this building is ideally suited. The parapet walls projected above the flat roof can be easily shaped and molded to your taste, giving your eco-house an original 'one-of-a-kind' look.