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Straw
Homes. Come To Town
SUNDAY SECTION
Sunday, March 26, 2000 |
Straw Homes. Come To Town
Once only found in the country, straw-bale houses have begun clearing
building permit hurdles in urban areas.
By JENNIFER OLDHAM, Times Staff Writer
The
straw-bale house, once found only in the sticks, is coming to town.
From Santa Barbara to San Diego, building
officials are giving their blessing to straw-bale houses that are
cropping up between tract homes and alongside beach bungalows.
Matt Buckmaster and his wife, Jan Vucinich, are
among the first in Southern California to obtain permits for straw-bale
homes. Buckmaster is building the two-story house himself, with
occasional help from contractors, in the suburbs just outside Santa
Barbara.
Tucked behind a dilapidated redwood barn at the
end of a long driveway, the 1,600-square-foot home has a commanding view
of suburban houses below.
At a "bale raising" last fall,
neighbors and friends helped the couple stack bales in the home's
post-and-beam framework. The bales were then skewered with reinforcing
bar and covered with chicken wire and stucco.
Buckmaster, 38, a feed store owner, spent many
long days and nights mastering straw-bale building techniques. But he and
Vucinich, 40, a preschool director, remain good-natured trailblazers for
the growing straw-bale movement.
"I would love to see more people get turned
on to the notion," Buckmaster said. "That was definitely part
of why we did it, to illustrate what can be done."
The couple's home cost $200,000, cheaper than a
conventional house, largely because Buckmaster acted as general
contractor.
Built Without Permits in Past
Until recently, most straw-bale houses were
built without permits in rural areas where the nearest neighbor was
around the bend or over the next hill.
But California and Oregon, and some
jurisdictions in Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and Colorado, have amended
their building codes to allow straw homes.
Armed with tests that prove straw-bale houses'
ability to retard fire, repel pests and rodents and withstand moisture
and earthquakes, property owners are applying for--and obtaining--permits
to build with straw.
"Five or six years ago you would have had a
hard time finding building officials that would consider a straw-bale
house," said Bob Fowler, chief building official for the city of
Pasadena and a well-known proponent of alternative building methods.
"But I would dare say now that if you
walked in with plans that have an engineer's stamp on them, they would
probably issue permits."
Law Amended to Allow Structures
Following standards set in the Pima County/City
of Tucson Uniform Building Code, California lawmakers amended the state's
Health and Safety Code in 1996 to allow straw-bale structures. Local
jurisdictions can adopt these guidelines or use them as a reference.
About half of the state's 58 counties have
adopted these standards and have permitted straw-bale structures,
according to the California Straw Building Assn., a 4-year-old group of
architects, builders and engineers with about 100 active members.
The number of permitted straw-bale homes in the
state doubled last year to about 200, the group said.
These homes are concentrated in Mendocino, San
Luis Obispo and San Diego counties and in the state's Central Valley and
its gold country, said Bruce King, a structural engineer in Sausalito and
author of "Buildings of Earth and Straw: Structural Design for
Rammed Earth and Straw-Bale Architecture."
But building with straw is still quite difficult
in the state's most urbanized areas, including Los Angeles County, where
officials have yet to review an application for a permit for a straw-bale
home.
Given the cost of land in Los Angeles, home
builders are likely to shy away from a technique whose 22-inch-thick
walls hog precious square footage, Fowler said. Straw builders may also
have a tough time finding a structural engineer familiar with the
material to sign off on their plans--a requirement here because of
seismic issues, he added.
Advantages of Using Straw
Straw-bale proponents believe that the
resistance in highly urbanized areas will change as more people become
aware of the advantages to building with straw.
The first straw-bale houses in the United States
were built in the Nebraska Sand Hills in the early 1900s. About 25 of
these homes survive today. The practice then spread to the south but
petered out as conventional building materials became available in the
mid-1900s.
The straw-bale renaissance in the United States
began in the late 1980s, primarily in Arizona and New Mexico, where the
style is well suited to the hot, dry climate.
The renewed interest in straw homes was prompted
largely by their hardiness and their energy efficiency. They can last
twice as long as wood-frame homes and save up to 75% on heating and
cooling costs.
Straw-bale construction can also reduce building
costs. Depending on the "sweat equity" of the builder and the
home's design and amenities, straw homes can run from $20 to $75 a square
foot. Conventional wood-frame houses typically cost $45 to $75 a square
foot.
But because the shell of a home constitutes only
about 10% of its total cost, custom straw home prices often rank near
conventional home costs.
This was the case for Laguna Beach resident
Christopher Prelitz, 43, who spent about $150 a square foot on his
three-story straw-bale home, which sits in a small canyon surrounded by
1950s homes, remodeled bungalows and new houses.
A general contractor, Prelitz said he was drawn
to the hands-on experience provided by straw-bale construction.
"I really like the idea of molding your own
space," he said. "There's something to it when you've actually
physically put the mud on your own walls that makes it your own
place."
Much of the material Prelitz used to build his
eclectic home was recycled. Some of the framing lumber came from old
movie sets, and the deck's guardrail posts are old telephone poles.
Prelitz, who has a mortgage on his house, didn't
have trouble selling his lender on straw-bale construction.
"As long as you have a permit and as long
as it is in city boundaries, lenders don't have a problem with it,"
Prelitz said.
But in county jurisdictions, "there can be
snags because they don't have as stringent building codes as cities do,
so lenders worry about their investment."
Before he secured financing, Prelitz had to
educate Laguna Beach officials on the material's merits. The city had
never before processed an application for a straw-bale home, but Prelitz
provided test results proving straw's integrity as a construction
material.
After reviewing the results, building officials
approved Prelitz's 3,000-square-foot home.
He designed and built the house himself over two
years with the help of his employees and subcontractors and is doing the
final touches this month.
Buckmaster and Vucinich also used recycled
materials throughout their hillside Santa Barbara home. There's the straw
in the walls, wood recycled from an old slaughterhouse on the window
frames and an old glass entryway from the Santa Barbara art museum as the
front door.
Home Will Save in Energy Costs
The couple's neighbors were thankful that they
didn't overbuild on their 1.6-acre lot, which was once part of a ranch
where walnuts, lemons and avocados grew.
"One of our neighbors was at the bale
raising and said he was glad we weren't putting five houses up
here," Buckmaster said.
Buckmaster finished his plan check in Santa
Barbara County in just a few weeks. His architect, James Bell, met with
county officials ahead of time to talk with them about straw and other
"sustainable" materials Buckmaster planned to use in the house.
Because the home would save more than 15% in
energy costs, the plans went through the county's innovative building
review committee, which was friendly to the idea.
But even after a permit is issued, building with
straw bales is a learning process for the property owner and officials.
"The county inspector first asked for a
vapor barrier (between the straw and the plaster)," Buckmaster said.
"But then he went and read up on straw and knew that it didn't need
a vapor barrier, so he came back and told me to forget it."
Despite growing acceptance, getting a straw home
approved by building officials in some places is still a struggle.
"I have yet to meet a straw-bale homeowner
who doesn't absolutely love living in a straw-bale home," said Judy
Knox, co-owner and co-founder of Out on Bale, a Tucson-based firm that
helped jump-start the current straw-bale movement.
"But I also have yet to meet someone who
didn't undergo much hardship with building a straw home."
It took Berkeley residents Debbie and Roger
Jackson four years to get the final building permit for a straw-bale home
proposed for a lot they own in Modoc County. County officials were
reluctant to permit the unconventional method and took a lot of
convincing.
The Jacksons, who filed their first set of plans
in June 1995, got incremental permits from the county for the house. A
permit for the foundation was issued in 1997 and one for the frame and
the roof in 1998.
"You're definitely tap dancing the whole
time and coming up with new ideas," said Debbie, a 47-year-old
research biochemist. "The organization of it takes a long
time."
The Modoc County Board of Supervisors adopted
the state's straw-bale guidelines in 1996, but it took the building
department three years to catch up with the guidelines.
Hope to Move In This Summer
The department issued final approval for the
Jacksons' 2,700-square-foot home last July. They hope to move in this
summer.
After they got the permit, the Jacksons held a
"bale raising." Reminiscent of old-fashioned barn raisings,
bale raisings usually involve several dozen participants, many of whom
travel long distances--and even pay--for a weekend of hands-on
instruction in how to build a straw home.
At most bale raisings, participants learn to
stack and secure bales into the walls of a post-and-beam home from an
architect or straw building expert. Then they go to work, lifting and
fitting the heavy bales into the home's walls.
Like the Jacksons, Buckmaster and Prelitz, some
owners build straw-bale homes on their own (with the help of contractors)
after a bale raising. But this is starting to change as more homeowners
and architects learn about the technique.
"In the early days it was much more the
owner-builder types [at our workshops]," said Matts Myhrman,
co-owner and co-founder of Out on Bale, which holds bale raisings across
the country. "We've seen more architects and engineers come on board
as codes have been adopted in urban areas."
The Demographic Is Widening
Berkeley architect Dan Smith, one of the
founding members of the California Straw Building Assn., has also seen
the demographic of straw-home builders widen.
"In the last couple of years I've had quite
a few more upper-end clients," Smith said. "It's definitely
moving into a realm of substantial houses. People are seeing it as a
higher-quality house for the aesthetic and thermal qualities."
So what's next for straw-bale construction now
that it's made inroads into some urban areas?
"The resurgence has reached a stage where
we're sort of hung between being a mainstream building method and a
pioneering building method," said Knox of Out on Bale. "There
are still widespread areas where there's not code acceptance or problems
with insurance and financing."
To bring wider acceptance, straw-bale proponents
must standardize building techniques, said David Eisenberg, co-director
for the Development Center for Appropriate Technology, a Tucson nonprofit
that promotes alternative building techniques.
Uniform techniques are needed to make the permit
process more efficient and because straw's increasing popularity has led
to sloppy construction by inexperienced builders, experts said.
Americans can't expect to see subdivisions of
straw-bale homes until this is done, Eisenberg said.
"For straw-bale, the challenge is finding
ways to really optimize the construction systems so builders, contractors
and developers can build them well and make money doing it."
Copyright 2000 Los Angeles Times