Earthbag (4)

Sasha Rabin’s earthen dome in the high desert of Southern California. Made of cob, earth bags, clay, and adobe. 500 sq. ft.

• Featured in our upcoming book Small Homes, due out in April 2017

Hi Lloyd,

My name is Atulya K. Bingham and I run The Mud earthbag building website (www.themudhome.com). I hope my story inspires a few others to go for their dreams too.

I always wanted to write, and like many writers it was a passion I had to crowbar in between slabs of paid work. Then one day I had enough of compromising. Fortunately, I owned a small square of land in Turkey. I moved up there with a tent and not much else. It was the beginning of an adventure that changed every preconceived idea about what actually made me happy. Six months later, with only $6000 left and winter a month away, I gathered a team and embarked on the construction of a small earthbag house. I had zero building experience at the time.

Building my house was probably the most transformative thing I’ve ever taken on (and I’m no stranger to adventure). I ran out of money, made a heap of mistakes and was continually hounded by naysayers. But today I’m sitting inside that beautiful handcrafted home. Not one drop of cement was used and it is 100% solar-powered. My earthbag house has enabled me to leave behind the drudge of a job my heart wasn’t in and spend my days creating and writing instead. I love it.

There’s a free earthbag building PDF to download from my site if anyone wants it.

I’ve written the full story of the earthbag adventure in my popular book, Mud Ball.

–Atulya K. Bingham
Author of the OBBL winner Ayse’s Trail, and The Mud website.

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