Castles Made of Sand
Iranian architect Nader Kahlili fashions affordable, easily assembled housing out of sandbags and concrete for a surprsingly striking result.
In 1976, Nader Khalili shuttered his Tehran design office, boarded a motorcycle, and—like an architectural Che Guevara—set off on a five-year odyssey, traveling the countryside and studying Iran’s ancient adobe construction techniques. “I was searching for a way to create a building that was totally in harmony with nature, that could be available to everybody around the world,” Khalili recalls. “The adobes were environmentally harmonious. But one earthquake would destroy them.” Khalili’s initial solution? “Ceramic houses—I set them on fire and glazed them.” Using this novel strengthening technique, the architect successfully rebuilt old dwellings and constructed new school buildings in a number of desert villages.
What worked in Iran, however, where clay-rich earth and hot-burning oil were plentiful, didn’t necessarily travel well. In 1983, Khalili was in California pondering the problem when NASA called, seeking ideas for building on the moon. The tirelessly imaginative architect proposed Velcro-coated bags that could be filled with lunar dust and coiled into cylinders. “I thought, Why not apply this idea to housing on earth?”
The result is the “superadobe” structure: layers of sandbags set in a circular plan, with a strand of four-point barbed wire between each level to provide stability, and corbeled at the top into a dome-shaped roof. This simple design offers multiple advantages: The buildings are earthquake-, hurricane-, and flood-resistant. Khalili’s basic unit, a three-room, 400-square-foot house he calls the Moon Cocoon, can be erected by five laborers—four of them unskilled—within weeks. They are sustainable, adaptable, and literally dirt-cheap.
Khalili, founder of the California Institute of Earth Art and Architecture (Cal-Earth), is proud that super-adobes have proliferated throughout the Americas, Asia, and Africa, and received the approval of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. But he seems proudest of their appearance. “You can never build one of these that doesn’t look beautiful,” Khalili says. “Just as you have never seen an ugly tree or an ugly flower.”
Articles
-
Sands Castle
Jeff and Larissa Sand cut their commute down to a few flights of stairs when they moved their industrial design studio, architecture office, and metalwork shop into the first two floors of their…
-
Earth Sheltered Homes
Homes built underground (aka Earth Sheltered Homes) are starting to look pretty enticing, what with the state of the economy and all. And contrary to what you'd think, they can be light, airy and…
Products
-
Desert Limestone
Desert Limestone Caesarstone’s quartz surfaces retain the cool, tactile qualities of natural stone with aggregates ranging from fine to coarse-grained color blends for various visual textures…
-
Castle Textiles
Color us glad to have come across the lovely textiles from Autralia-based designer Rachel Castle. Her collection of bright-but-simple bedlinens, throws, cushions, and embroidered artwork is beyond…
-
House of Earth and Light Print
This is the only project to be featured in Dwell twice (and it was on the cover of our first issue). We returned to the house when it received a new roof design and was finally completed. Although…
Events
-
Project Earth Day Fashion Show and Design Competition
Project Earth Day is dedicated to green design principles and sustainability, and to providing a platform for environmental responsibility and innovation within the fashion industry. Brought to you…
-
Green California Summit
The 2010 Green California Summit will take place in the state capital, at the Sacramento Convention Center. State and local governments in California have long set the standard for public sector…
-
2011 Green California Summit
The 2011 Green California Summit is coming to Sacramento on April 19-20, with pre-Summit sessions on April 18. 2011 also brings the first-ever CALGreen Academy, a special series of classes…
Advertising
Advertising
Advertising
Related Products
-
Desert Limestone
Desert Limestone Caesarstone’s quartz…
-
Castle Textiles
by Rachel CastleColor us glad to have come across the lovely…
-
House of Earth and Light Print
by Andrew HolderThis is the only project to be featured in…
Latest
-
02.09
An Architecture Guide to Pyongyang
German architect and writer Philipp Meuser realizes that…
-
02.08
Fair Chairs
We continue our coverage of the 2012 Stockholm Furniture and…
-
02.07
Seven from Stockholm Design Week
It's about mid-way through the 2012 Stockholm Design Week and…
Follow
Dwell
Reloading tweets…
WONDERFUL ! Whats the material of the bags that keep the sand toguether.
wow.Impressive. Kept wondering what they looked like inside,then came that last pic, blew me away. thanks for posting. Just goes to show thinking outside the box can have impressive results
RSS Feed
Add a Comment