"Today, held clay in my for the first time, I hands. It felt like holding a baby for the first time — you don’t yet know this child, but you already love him." This heartfelt expression of awe and delight was spoken by Lyudmila Zaytseva of Russia, through an interpreter, to the other participants at the Natural Building Colloquium held at the historic Black Range Lodge (www.blackrangelodge.com) in Kingston, New Mexico in October 2003. This sense of reverence for earthen building materials was echoed by many of the 50 people who gathered from across the U.S and from Russia, Israel, Denmark, Chile, Nicaragua, and England to share information, resources, and expertise, and to "get down and dirty", collaboratively creating structures of nature’s abundant gifts.

Catherine Wanek, author of The New Strawbale Home, and Pete Fust, the king of "tractor cob", are the welcoming and generous owners of the Lodge and coordinators of this year’s event. The Lodge and the hamlet of Kingston, nestled in the foothills of the 3 million acre Gila Wilderness, offer a taste of the old west and a playground for natural building enthusiasts to live in nature’s beauty while exercising their creativity and developing their skills. Drawing neophytes as well as seasoned architects, designers, and builders, the magic of this event was evoked when everyone engaged as equals in hands-on applications. Participants were asked to introduce themselves to the group by speaking "what they were most passionate about" and, in addition to the scheduled presenters and workshop facilitators, all were encouraged to bring materials and offer presentations about their own work, which spanned the spectrum from personal housing, to professional building, to community scale projects.

Fueled by lovingly prepared fresh, healthy, organic food, participants chose from a smorgasbord of opportunities for learning, sharing, connecting, creating, and playing. Though the Colloquium was intensely information rich, and the schedule of activities jam-packed, the tone was inspiring, energizing and fun. Sareya Gould, a 10 year old who attended with her father and twin sister expressed that sense when explaining that prior to the Colloquium, she was "afraid it would be all work, but I discovered that it was work and play at the same time!" One of my own fondest memories from the week was of dancing in the mud as we prepared cob with our feet for reconstructing the Phoenix outdoor bread oven/bench, while a golf cart of musicians spontaneously fiddled their way around the grounds giving energy to the builders of the various projects occurring simultaneously.

The breadth of creative applications of age-old building techniques combined with innovative alternative technologies was amazing. A mix of hands-on workshops, presentations, and discussion groups offered information and real time learning regarding straw bale, cob, papercrete, earthbag, and organic timber frame construction, ferro cement water catchment, greywater systems, rainwater harvesting, aerobic pumice wick waste water systems, passive and active solar and photovoltaics, pallet truss construction, soil enrichment and tree planting, and running diesel car and truck engines on free, used vegetable oil. Collectively we built a straw bale emergency shelter, an earthbag root cellar, a tractor cob wall, solar cooking ovens, a tamped earth floor, mixed and troweled the earth plaster finish coat to a publisher’s office in town, applied Clayote plaster to the inside of a building constructed by previous Colloquium attendees, mixed and painted aliz on the interior walls of the largest meeting space, and were delighted by the "hotel" that the youngest participants independently constructed with straw bales and pallets.

Many Colloquium participants reported that they experienced benefits beyond what they expected. Todd Gould, a conventional builder from southern Illinois, said "I came to expand my knowledge of sustainable architecture, but I feel that this has been a life-changing event... that I have been put on a path that I don’t quite understand yet." He also expressed a knowing that "this is bigger than all of us." Building with natural materials in a way that honors the earth and other species can be a cost-effective way of creating housing in places where there is great need. Builders without Borders, (www.BuildersWithoutBorders.org), an international network of ecological builders working together for a sustainable future, was highlighted several times at the Colloquium as an effective vehicle for creating self-sufficiency in communities around the world.

Several authors and publishers generously shared their experiences and expectations, respectively. HopeDance, Mother Earth News (www.motherearthnews.com) and New Society Publishers (www.newsociety.com) encouraged submissions that would bring information and excitement about natural building and sustainable living to a larger audience. David Eisenberg, Executive Director of the Development Center for Alternative Technology (www.dcat.net), who has made deep inroads in guiding the building regulations industry to accept and legitimize natural building technologies, concluded his talk with a quote that suggests how to spread the word about natural building : "the way to subvert the dominant paradigm is to have more fun than they do and to make sure they know about it." This community of pioneers who enthusiastically and energetically worked and played together, each wholeheartedly offered their piece of the larger vision of creating a more sustainable, healthy world based on the principles and patterns of nature. Judy Knox, who along with her husband Matts Myhrman has been at the forefront of the strawbale revival (www.azstarnet.com/~dcat/outbale.htm), invited us to "become a demonstration of the world we wish to create." The "demonstrations" at this Colloquium exponentially boosted my level of hope for the world!

The 2004 Natural Building Colloquium will be hosted by Gaiatecture, a sustainable architecture firm and The Peaceweavers community at The Thunder Mountain Wellness Center in Bath, New York (the Finger Lakes region), June 26 - July 3. For more information, please contact gaiatecture@hotmail.com/ 585-624-2540 or pw@peaceweavers.com/607-776-4060.

Jane Norton is Chief Visionary Officer of Eartheal, (www.eartheal.org), a non-profit offering education and community service projects for creating a sustainable world, and President of Natural Re-Sourcing Partners, a coaching/consulting firm facilitating development of sustainable lifestyles and organizations.

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