Big Bend Real Estate Guide May 2020 | Page 21

Geri Cornier Papercrete home, Alpine. Continued from page 13. banks and other businesses. Often, we would find piles of shredded paper bags in front of our house, thrown there from who knows where. Building walls and smaller projects generated much interest and we were approached mostly by newcomers to the area who wanted complete homes. Because of the low carbon footprint, the sculptural beauty and other benefits, the demand for it snowballed. Gearing up and getting a work crew together, we started building homes under the name eBuilders. We built two complete homes and made blocks for two more. They were pretty conventional designs, with a traditional metal roof but with a parapet wall to give them the look of an adobe house. This was all very businesslike and rather 20 lucrative, but the fun of building something unusual with domes and vaults was missing. Eventually, working with Mercedes Lujan and Hiram Sibley, we started building a personal home made with PC vaults and a dome, incorporating materials salvaged from a movie set. The main vault was a Nubian design, which is a classic shape that is more pleasing aesthetically than a barrel vault. The ancient Nubians of northern Africa came up with a formula for laying up mud bricks that gives it the classic shape and also adds additional strength by putting the weight directly over the outside walls where it should be, eliminating the need for buttressing. The vault and dome were plastered with finish stucco and has no waterproofing. This allows it to “breathe,” and it has never leaked in a rainstorm. The square foot price of a PC home is not easily calculated, but a small house we finished in Alpine came out roughly the same as building with conventional lumber framing. But, notably, it is far less costly than adobe construction but with the same high end quality and characteristics. Using long slip forms and pouring the wall instead of making blocks saves time and keeps the cost down. PC construction is not rocket science, so a layman homeowner could conceivably put their back into it and really save on labor costs. Since it can be easily formed and molded into interesting shapes, vaults, nichos, carvings, parapet walls and all kinds of creative features are open to the imagination. It also has great possibilities for sculptors. Even large scale public art is possible. Having done a few PC sculptures, I can see how this could be an ideal artistic medium. PC makes a lot of sense in an age of dwindling resources and the necessity of energy conservation. It has very high insulating R values, saves trees and landfill space, is great for soundproofing, and 60% of the material required to make it, paper, is free. Civil Engineering Magazine in 2006 published the data from tests done on PC at the University of Arizona and it passed with flying colors. But like any kind of building, it must be done right. The right mixture proportions for blocks, mortar, and plaster needs to be adhered to. City codes must be met. But it is no longer an oddity. It is a very practical alternative method of sustainable building. n Big Bend Real Estate Guide • May 2020