Circular houses, made of earth, built by their future inhabitants with their own hands, friendly to the environment and low cost. For many this will sound like an architecture from distant times, whether past or future, but in reality it is a bioconstruction technique known as superabe and, above all, a viable route to one day have your own house.
“A system focused on the construction of housing as a basic human right, where each person participates in the creation of their own homes and communities, preserving the natural resources and energy of the planet,” is how the superabe Ángel Montes de Oca defines specialist in this technique and who has been practicing and teaching it for more than 1 decade in Mexico, specifically in Tepoztlán, Morelos.
A home originally designed for the moon (and that works amazingly on Earth)
The Superbe was created by the Iranian architect Nader Khalili (1936–2008) and presented to NASA as an alternative to building houses on the moon and Mars. Its incredible structural resistance, which involves the use almost exclusively of raw materials from the immediate environment (earth), as well as its thermal qualities, make this system a more than viable option for any terrain.
How does Superbe work?
Long bags are filled with soil and secured with barbed wire. They are arranged in a circular shape and arches are mounted. “It is a large adobe, long and flexible. They are long bags that are filled with the earth available, forming rings in layers that work in compression, with strands of barbed wire placed between them to act as mortar, working with tension, creating arches that in turn form domes or vaults,” Ángel explains to us in an interview, and quotes Khalili: “With this construction technique we are not abandoning technology; “We are maintaining the best of the past, moving forward into the future.”
Precisely, this structure of arches and vaults gives the houses earthquake-proof resistance. In this sense, it is a design that integrates traditional earthen architecture with the safety standards of contemporary cities. According to Montes de Oca, the superabe structures comply with all the guidelines required by the construction codes of the state of California in terms of earthquakes, and also stand out for their resistance against fires, floods and hurricanes.
What are the great advantages of superabe?
The structures that result from building with superabe have notable qualities – it is no coincidence that it is one of the most popular bioconstruction techniques around the world.
Sustainable: due to the efficiency of materials and resources.
Economical: due to the use of materials from the environment and the possibility of building the house, mostly, with your own hands. The square of a superabe house costs around $3,500 Mexican pesos ($150 USD).
Anti-seismic: due to its system of arches and vaults.
Aerodynamics: due to its circular shapes and spaces.
Thermal: due to the thickness of the walls and the thermality of the earth.
Aesthetics: Although it is subjective, many people consider superabe houses to be especially beautiful.
Where to learn to build houses with superabe?
There are books in which, in a quite didactic way, the authors explain step by step how to build a superabe structure. One of the most popular is Khalili’s Emergency Sandbag Shelter and Eco Village. If you want more experiential learning, we suggest you look for a workshop. If you live in Mexico you can write to Ángel (arquitecturaarmonia@gmail.com), or do it through the site Arquitecturaenarmonía.com or their Facebook page.