During these three weeks you will construct a sauna and, time permitting, a cob oven, from start to finish. As part of this program you will learn the basics of making a foundation, building four different wall systems with materials including cob, straw bale, light-straw-clay and cob-cordwood, and constructing a living roof. In addition you will learn earthen plastering techniques, tour a variety of beautiful natural buildings, spend time designing your own projects and enjoy the many recreational and cultural opportunities the Rogue Valley has to offer.

The location of the structure is on a large property in the town of Ashland. Participants will camp on-site and be served three organic meals six days a week with one day off each week. Besides the field trips within the workshop schedule, participants will finish their stay with a one-day rafting trip on the scenic Rogue River. In order to provide the highest quality teaching this apprenticeship is limited to four individuals.

James will be building in Ecuador from January 15th to April 2nd. He will be in email and Skype contact during this time, but if you’d like to contact him by phone before or after these dates, please call 541-488-0916.

This post was submitted by James Haim.

Concerned about the world’s state of affairs? Ready to be part of the solution? Begin now, start with home. Two programs to guide you in making changes in your lifestyle, consumerism, health and well-being, career and livelihood, based on ecological values and Natural Building principles and practices. This is designed to support you into creating a life that you, your family and community can feel proud of. We now offer a unique training program for persons looking for a lifestyle and career change. You will have support in adjusting your lifestyle to fit your conscience and to meet the new conditions of the 21st century.

Our Natural Builder Apprenticeship program will help you become skilled as a professional Natural Builder or teacher, and will enable you to build your own Natural Home as well as teach others to do the same. Covers all aspects of building cob and natural homes using a range of earth building techniques and other natural materials – wood, both milled and roundwood, stone, lime, clay, straw, together with creative use of industrial and commercial waste and surplus. We’ll work on all phases of a house – walls, floors, roofs, etc., helping complete buildings already in progress at the school and beginning new buildings elsewhere. We will also work on honing skills in putting the final and beautiful touches on buildings. The emphasis is on a hands-on understanding of materials and how they work, design, and creative space-creation. But those are just the techniques, here at Cob Cottage Company we go so far beyond technique, check out our Theme’s for Natural Building and living on our website for more information. You will work alongside a professional/instructor on a one on one basis. Main instructor and course facilitator for 2012 will be Jo Forsythe, Natural Builder, Cob Cottage Instructor and alumni. Other Instructors that you will more than likely be working with over the course of the 8 weeks include Linda Smiley, Betty Seaman, Chip Boggs, Ianto Evans, Kiko Denzer, Bernhard Masterson, Deanne Bednar, and a host of other nationally known professionals. As an apprentice, you will have access to all our fascinating visitors and the workshops throught the summer. And our commitment to you doesn’t stop at the 8 weeks – we ask you to commit a year to be fully immersed in continuing your Natural Building Education, we also commit a year to helping you do jus that! Apprentices are based at Cob Cottage Company’s campus in Coquille, Oregon.

This post was submitted by Tammy.

For the 8th year, House Alive is offering people the unique opportunity to immerse themselves in the art of Natural Building. With this 6-week apprenticeship, students will develop the skills and confidence to build for themselves or others, and teach others what they have learned. This program is also ideal for the owner-builder who is interested in a well rounded, extended training program.

Learning how to design and build is like many arts: the more you do it, the better you get. During the course, we will build a small cabin from the ground up. We will go through the steps of designing and building the cabin, and paying close attention to skill development at each stage so that everyone can broaden their understanding of the challenges that face builders and teachers.

At the end of the 6 weeks, we aim for students to have developed their skills and understanding in the following areas:
* Designing houses, cabins and outdoor spaces
* Site preparation and foundations
* Wall construction: cob, straw bale, light-straw-clay
* Doors, windows, niches, built-in furniture,
* Basic plumbing for natural buildings
* Basic electricity for natural buildings
* Earthen plasters on cob, drywall, and other materials
* Earthen floors on compacted grade as well as on conventional surfaces
* Harvesting and working with round poles
* Roofs, ceilings and insulation
* Building wood fired bread and pizza ovens
* Use of recycled materials
* Working with groups

The general schedule of the program is 5 days of of building and learning (Monday-Friday), with a field trip each Saturday morning. We are lucky enough to have many other cob and natural building in the area and will take time to visit those and learn from what we see.

Apprentices will be provided with a place to camp and all food for the duration of the program, and will be asked to take turns assisting with the food preparation. Our extensive natural building library will be available for after-hours reading, and hand-outs will be provided as appropriate.

Students who demonstrate good skill progression may be invited to further their building and teaching skills by joining the teaching team as an assistant for a House Alive workshop. We will actively coach you in your development as a teacher.

This has been one of our most popular and successful programs over the years, and it tends to fill up quickly. There are no prerequisites to participation, but we ask that you answer a number of questions to make sure that what we have to offer will fit your needs. We feel that all of us, instructors and students, make a big commitment in time and money during these long programs and we want to make sure that it is a good match for all. If you’re interested in joining us this spring, send your application in now!

This post was submitted by Coenraad Rogmans.

For the seventh straight year, House Alive! is offering an opportunity for people to get beyond the basics and experience an extended Natural Building apprenticeship. This popular, hands-on, intensive course is designed for people who want to use natural building skills in a professional context or who want to take extra time to work on skill development for their personal project. Participants will get first-hand experience with every aspect of building a natural home, from the foundation to the roof. Learning how to build a natural home is one of the best investments you can make: once you know how to design, build and shape your own living space, you can save many thousands of dollars in living costs.

This program will be almost exclusively “hands-on” learning. Learning to build is like learning to play a musical instrument: It is hard to learn without another experienced person guiding you and, the more you do it the better you get. The apprenticeship program for 2011 offers 7 weeks of building, problem solving, designing and discussing all aspects of natural building, allowing you to take the time to develop new skills under the guidance of experienced natural builders.

This year we’re pleased to be collaborating with Lydia Doleman of Flying Hammer Productions (www.theflyinghammer.com). Lydia has been building with mud and bales for more than 12 years, and has a vast portfolio of beautiful natural buildings she’s built in Portland. Lydia and James will each teach approximately half of the apprenticeship.

Throughout the course we’ll be working on the different elements of building a small (about 200 sq. ft.) cob and straw-bale cabin from the ground up. Demonstrations and instruction will be given as needed to explain building techniques and design choices. Participants should expect full and exciting days.

The course will take place at Full Bloom Farm, a developing intentional community and large organic farm in a beautiful, secluded valley in Southern Oregon. It is also the home of Rise Up Bakery, which provides delicious fresh bread from their wood-fired oven to businesses and residents in the area. The farm has 280 acres of meadow and forest, 2 creeks and a swimming pond.

For more information or to apply to the program, please read the full workshop description!

This post was submitted by House Alive.

Come live and work in our rural intentional community and join us in constructing our new Community House. Areas will include framing, natural wall systems, base coat and finish plasters, living roofs and finish carpentry. Visit www.emeraldearth.org or contact community@emeraldearth.org.

This post was submitted by Emerald Earth.

The Natural Building Skillbuilder 2010 is a 9 week internship program at O.U.R.Ecovillage.
Participate in our learning community and learn natural building techniques.
Please read more on our website:

http://ourecovillage.org/our-activities/education-2/natural-building-skillbuilder/

This post was submitted by Elke Cole.

Cobworks is currently seeking 4-6 apprentices to build with us this summer.
During the course, apprentices will learn how to:
build a dry-stack stone foundations while working with a minimal amount of
concrete
select and collect sustainable roundwood from forest
run a small bandsaw mill; turning logs to lumber
design and build a greywater system and composting toilet
learn to safely operate power construction tools
build a round post & beam log frame building, using a quick and strong
notching method
install an earthen floor with radiant heating
For the first 3 weeks we will be building a stone foundation and earthen
floor for a 1,000sq.ft. recording studio. We will also be building the post
and beam frame and milling the rafters. Cob and Community runs from July
11th-24th. We expect 12-16 additional participants for this event.
For the final 3 weeks we will be finish building and prepping the cob walls
and getting the roof on. We will also use a tractor to mix mega batches of
cob to speed up the mixing. We will finish up by mixing up some test
plasters with different materials and pigments.
Upon completion of the Apprenticeship program, participants will have the
skills and confidence to take on their own project. Many people take this
course to become natural building instructors and go on to earn a living in
the building trade.
Participants will camp in community in the mountains above Summerland, B.C.
in the Okanagan Valley. All food will be local and organic when possible.
Apprentices will share in food prep and community living. For more
information, please email pat@cobworks.com.
Cost of the Apprenticeship Program is $3,000.