The Strawbale Studio in Oxford, Michigan is a collaborative project where we practice and teach natural building skills, and explore a wide variety of sustainable living principles. We welcome you to our online tour, and hope you will come play with us soon!

"The experience of completing the exterior walls of the strawbale studio, protecting the strawbales with a generous layer of earthen stucco, has evoked layers of feeling and ancient memory. There is an artistic thrill and wild freedom in shaping, smoothing, and building a rounded corner wall by pulling out handfulls of straw or pounding it with my fist. There is viscereal pleasure when the bare soles of my feet sink into the sand / mud mixture. Something wakes up! A billion more sensory cells are informing me! Laughter bubbles to the surface! Exploring materials... trying new combinations... this is a method of discovery that can be shared by the three-year old to the 103-year-old, by the inexperienced and experienced. We are all welcomed by this media, this setting, this process."

The Strawbale Studio, a beautiful thatched roof cottage in rural Oxford Michigan, was conceived in 1996 by friends Fran, Deanne Bednar, and Carolyn Koch. None of these women are professionals, yet they were able with help, guidance, and intuition to build this beautiful natural structure, which today offers tours, workshops, and hands-on experience with natural building materials. Books which inspired the project include Christopher Day's "Places of the Soul: Architecture and Environmental Design as a Healing Art," as well as "Timeless Ways of Building," and "Pattern Language" by Christopher Alexander.

Due to the fluidity and flexibility of natural building materials, we were able to mold the studio around existing trees. You'll notice that even the shape of the studio is 'natural,' not boring, manufactured, and rectangular, but irregular, wild, and dynamic. It's very easy to mold natural plasters into any shape you desire, making it an art form as well as a building material! This makes for a very comfortable living space, and in fact, many people, upon entering such a natural structure, comment first not on how it looks, but on how it feels.

These children are mixing mud, clay, and straw, to create a natural plaster -- cob! Natural building is fun and easy, and we love to involve children in the process. Even adults like to feel the mud against the bare soles of our feet, let it seep and tickle the in-betweens of our toes! It brings back memories of childhood, and yet something more primal, it reminds us of the earth and our ancient connection to it. Our next big project on the Studio site is a "Kid's Cottage." How empowering it must feel for children (and adults!) to know they can play such a meaningful role, and see the end result of their efforts -- a beautiful, ecological, and inspiring shelter -- a place where people can live!

There are two types of strawbale structures: load-bearing and post-and-beam. The studio is an example of a post-and-beam strawbale structure, where a foundation is built of wood or other material, and straw serves to insulate the walls. In a load-bearing structure -- the original Nebraskan strawbales were load bearing -- the straw actually holds the weight of the roof. Straw is stronger than you might think! In northern climates (such as Michigan), where snow cover may weigh down the roof considerably, load-bearing is a more practical option. Here you see the wooden frame and stone foundation of the Strawbale Studio.