We did it! (technically)

So, this is it. The end of the "Big Week".

On the last day of the #Livebuild, we had a long list of things to complete. We had to complete the roof, which we couldn't do the day before because we ran out of the OSB sheets which we had used to make it. We also had to apply a layer of clay mixture, to serve as a seal for the straw bales, before applying a plaster layer of cob on top of that clay to fully seal the straw bales and allow us to smooth the wall down. This task was aided by the fact that we had already started applying the clay base layer on some of the straw bales the day before and even more so by the extra number of people we had on site volunteering their time to apply the cob onto the bales.

Some of the young volunteers getting their hands dirty
and putting cob on the wall.

We had a lot of people on site helping us with the "cobbing". But we also had to work around all those extra people to complete the roof. Because of health and safety concerns, we decided against carrying out high level work on the roof whilst we had that many people on site working on the cob wall. This, in turn, pushed our schedule further back a little because we couldn't do both at once. However, we had a lot of fun mixing the plaster for the walls, a process that involved using our feet to mix all of the ingredients to make the plaster.

Amy and Jodie getting in on the fun

Once we had the walls covered with the cob and we had gotten down to a few volunteers, we were able to get back to the roof, adding brackets and joints to improve the strength of the structure to make sure it can take the weight of the living roof.

A brief discussion before fixing
the joints into place.

As the daylight began fading, we realised that we still had a lot to do but not enough time to get it all done on Friday. So we focused on getting the OSB sheets fixed in place on the roof and the cob on the straw bale wall. By 8:30pm on Friday, we had managed to get all the sheets of OSB fixed in place and all the plaster on the wall. We even had time to sit round and have a celebratory pizza!

Behold, the shelter in all it's glory.
Beautiful. 

Of course, we had time to grab a couple of group photos.

There's always time for a group photo.

So after the end of the Big Week, we had completed the structure, but we still had a few things to sort out before the celebration evening 10 days after that Friday. A few of these were embellishments to the design, like putting down flooring inside the shelter, and few others were an important parts of the design, like adding more support to the structure on the sides to stop it from swaying horizontally under any heavy loads i.e. the living roof. We also have to put down the several layers of membranes and carpets before putting the soil on top of the structure, perhaps one of the most urgent items on the list because we had a seed bombing of the roof event planned on the celebration evening after the official ribbon cutting. All of which we will have to return to the site sometime between now and the celebration evening to do. Hence why we technically finished.

As we are at the other side of the project, looking back at the scale and ambition of the project it seems like we had the right idea. We had spent a lot of our time on site discussing ideas in order to overcome problems that had come up, mainly the lack of materials and sometimes a concern for the rigidity of the structure. This constant back and forth of ideas made the project feel much more open to everyone involved, as everyone managed to throw in some of their ideas into the mix. It also allowed me and the younger volunteers an insight into the thought process that goes into making a space, especially those who didn't have any practical experience with Architecture or even construction.

So, we did it!

Still a few kinks to straighten out and so it's all hands on deck to get everything ready for the ever important celebration evening!

Friday - young volunteers and squelchy clay render!

Today was all about the clay render of the straw bale walls (and finishing the roof structure). Here is our lovely volunteer Maria making sure there are no gaps in the straw bales before the clay render is applied.....

 

We were joined on site in the morning by a group of young people taking part in the Avon Wildlife Trust programme 'Tomorrow's People'. They were keen to get stuck in with the mixing up of the base coat of clay render....this is done using your feet and is a very pleasing but rather squelchy process! Here they are in action.....

We were also joined on site my Matthew, another of our lovely Shape My City 2015 young people - he got stuck in with all aspects of the build and a was a master clay plasterer by the end of the afternoon!

Our young 'Tomorrow's People' volunteers set to work applying the clay base coat to one of the walls...after some initial concerns about getting messy, most of them got stuck in and did a great job.

A busy afternoon then lay ahead for the core build team....there was lots to be done and it was going to be a late one.......check out our next blog post to see if we got the structure finished on time........

Thursday - straw bales!

Thursday was all about the straw bale walls! Earlier in the week, lovely farmer Jim from Wick (only 5 miles away - so very a local material) delivered 30 straw bales for the walls of our shelter The first job was to move them across the site.......

Next hazel spurs from on site were cut down to create fixings which would keep the bales in place. Jo gave the whole team a masterclass in how to split and retie bales(with a trucker's hitch!).

We were joined on site by Rosie, one of our lovely Shape My City young people and she helped Jo mix up the first batch of clay slip (undercoat).

Jo and Rosie then had great fun smearing the clay slip coat onto the first section of straw bale wall.....

 

We were also joined on site today by two lovely architecture student volunteers...Sunar and Jess, whose hard work and skills were much needed on this busy day (even though it took them a while to figure out how to make a cuppa with the rocket stove!)....thanks guys!

Wednesday - the roof, lovely volunteers and a test batch of clay render

Much of Wednesday was focussed on getting the main structure finshed and the roof underway. Here is Hani hard at work on the roofing braces!

We were joined on the #livebuild project by fantasic volunteers Brendan, a carpenter (his skills were invaluable) and Kareem, a UWE architecture and environmental engineering student (Kareem was involved throughout the design process prior to the build). Here they are hard at work on the roof:

On Wednesday afternoon Jo, our resident natural builder and cob expert collected the first load of clay brick substrate from in-kind sponsors Ibsotck Brick. Jo soaked a load of the clay ready for mixing up a batch of clay render to use next morning.

Jo also mixed up a small test batck of clay render, which she applied and left to dry....wonder what it will look like in the morning??

Update of Monday and Tuesday by Melvin

Monday

After the final day of digging out the holes for the gabions the next step was to make sure each foundation was square and level in comparison to the next. We also needed to decide how the rafters would fit onto the post protruding from the gabions which would then influence what size rafters we would need to source.

Levelling the gabion was a low skilled task however very frustrating, this was because the gabions had to be levelled individually as well as level with the other gabions and as one gabion was rammed in it was made more difficult. However despite this we managed to get all six gabions set into the ground completely level and started to attach the upper gabions to the ones just set in place.

The rafter position was decided after much discussion and Sally went out to source the wood which was scheduled for delivery tomorrow.

Tuesday

The day started with a briefing which consisted of what was scheduled to arrive and what we will be doing on site during the course of the day. The first thing on the agenda was to finish the previous day's work of attaching the rest of the surface gabions and filling them with bricks and ramming it with top soil. The patterns for the bricks was decided earlier in the week so they could accommodate the 4x4 posts snugly. This process was fairly straight forward but consistency with each level of bricks was key. 

Once the posts were fitted in the next job was to determine the height of the roof/rafters. By the end of the day on Tuesday the first roof rafters where in place. Wednesday would see the delivery of straw bales and the clay for the cob render arriving on site.
  
This post was writtien by Melvin, a member of the Shape My City 2015 group, who is spending his work experience week on the #livebuild project. 

Foundation Work

Clearing away the site and working out the positions of the Gabion containers paved the way for the next step in the process, which we had embarked on in day two on site.

The day mainly consisted of digging. Having worked out that each Gabion should be buried about 450mm below ground so that it's top is flush with the ground around it, we spent a large part of day two digging the six holes that we needed.

Site whilst holes are being excavated.
Gabions are being used to gauge the depth
of each hole. 

We started to get an idea of the scale of the structure that we are working towards once we had the six holes dug out and the Gabions placed inside each hole. Towards the end of the day, we levelled the Gabion in the far corner of the site, compacting the soil beneath it before filling it with the reclaimed bricks we had picked up earlier on day one.

So what's next? 

Plenty to do next week, the big week. So far, the build has been progressing nicely and according to plan, we hope to continue this momentum going into the big week. So here's what we have to do:

1) Carefully refill the excavated foundations, ramming the earth around it as we go, once we have the Gabions back in place and lined up with the plans. 

2) Set up area for deliveries that are going to be made to the site, mainly build materials, for Tuesday's deliveries. 

3) Hopefully start to assemble some of the timber framework for the structure, and work out how much more we need and maybe even adjust the design accordingly.

A big chunk of the work to do on site for the start of the week is going to be figuring out and refining the logistics involved in moving materials and people around the site. But the main aim of the first two days is to get the foundations sorted and make a start on the structure's framework.

Breaking Ground

A quick summary of the events that took place on day one on site

Our first day on-site was a busy and eventful one, the aim was to clear the site and start to experiment with our Gabion foundations.

First, we sorted through the different piles of wood that were on the site, making sure to categorise the timbers on how useful they will be and storing them separately for later use in construction. Once that was done, we split into two groups, two of us stayed on site and worked on clearing the more stubborn weeds and roots away whilst the other two went to pickup some of the reclaimed bricks we were planning on using to fill the Gabions, and also to pickup some lunch whilst we were out.

All hands on deck as we clear away some
 of the old wooden fences from the site

Upon our return, and after a quick meeting where we all caught up over a quick lunch, we went back and started working on levelling the site by spreading some of the earth that had built up in one particular area. This, along with most of day one, gave us the opportunity to test out the different types of media that we were going to be using to document the build process. The first lesson we had learnt from working with the equipment was to make sure that it is all charged and ready to be used, which our video cameras weren't. However, I managed to capture a quick time lapse of the site clearing process on my iPod to get an idea of how the time lapses could look.

Once we had cleared most of the weeds and levelled the site, we tested out the bricks and Gabions idea. This was promising given that the bricks and timber fit quite snugly into the Gabion, accommodating roughly 48 bricks per Gabion.

Jack working the bricks into the spaces.
All those years of Tetris finally paid off. 

After reviewing the designs and the measurements we noticed that we had actually got the scale wrong for the site. So it was back to the drawing board. We spent some time discussing the possible solutions to the scale problem, we agreed on moving the design further up into the site but also sectioning it into three distinct areas which are joined together by the structure, providing the versatility required of the structure whilst making efficient use of the space we have. Once we had gotten a rough idea of the shape of the structure, we plotted out where the Gabions would sit.

"What is this?"

So what's next?

Having worked out a new plan, the plan for Day Two is as follows:

1) Dig out the holes for the Gabions to sit in, starting with the furthest corner of the site as that could be the one that is the most problematic. 

2) Fill the Gabions with bricks and place them into the foundations, making sure that they are ready for the posts and the scaffolding works. 

3) Set out and mark the Bale wall's form.

4) Update materials list and plan out the schedule for the big week, next week. 

Day Two looks like it'll be a big one, lots to do!