Today I am talking with Natural Builder, Tim White. I met Tim at the Crestone Energy Fair in Crestone, Colorado, an eclectic town where I was introduced to natural building materials and techniques. Tim has been in the natural building industry for almost 30 years. During the Fair, Tim gave a talk onClay Plasters, and I was hit with more truth bombs about the built environment in that one talk than I had ever been. All of it made intuitive sense, and Tim clearly had a plethora of knowledge to offer on the topic. Backed by hard science through his studies in anthropology and archaeology, Tim distilled many health and environmental issues down to a simple dichotomy: conventional building materials versus monolithic organic (natural) materials.
Our conventional wisdom tells us that modern materials are durable, reliable, and safe. In fact, conventional building materials are toxic, highly combustible, and create over 30% of the world’s waste. The archaeological record shows that humans have used natural building materials for millenia. Their use is circular, sustainable, better for our health, and aesthetically pleasing. In fact, the techniques that Tim describes in this episode create temperature and humidity controlled environments that are livable without use of a thermostat. I invite you stoke your curiosity at the hearthside of Tim’s abundant wisdom on the benefits that natural building brings to humankind. Please enjoy.__________
1:45 - What is Natural Building?
16:15 - Applications for a Conventional Builder
18:21 - Materials
23:45 - Hondo Project
30:59 - Toxins in the Built Environment
35:51 - Optimizing Your Health
38:56 - Problems in Conventional Building
39:52 - Building Codes
49:39 - Scaling Natural Building
57:53 - Ayahuasca Temple (Spring Construction)
1:02:45 - Unconditioning
1:06:05 - Final Thoughts & Recs __________
If you enjoyed today’s episode and found it insightful, please like the show and follow wherever you get your podcasts. A special thank-you to theCrestone Energy Fair for providing hands-on workshops, tours, and panel discussions on natural building.
The music for this podcast is Siesta by Ikson, part of the “Tell Your Story” project—a library of free music for content creators. Visit ikson.com to explore the full catalog.
