Hands-on weekend workshops
Build shelter from the earth, not at its expense.
For most of human history, people built their own homes from what the land offered — earth, straw, stone and timber. Natural building brings those techniques into the present: low-cost, low-impact structures with real thermal performance, built by the hands that will live in them.
Cob, light earth and adobe block techniques — where each one shines, and hands-on wall building you can feel by the end of a weekend.
Earthen renders, lime plasters and natural paints that let buildings breathe in a humid climate.
Where natural building meets the real world: site safety, structure basics, and working safely at heights — taught by an actual safety trainer.
Workshops are run hands-on with experienced natural builders, with safety supervision as the house specialty. Register your interest to hear dates first.
Nobody invents this craft alone — it's passed hand to hand, usually with mud up to the elbows. Straun's earth-building practice is grounded in workshops with two of Australia's most respected practitioners:
Hands-on Earthship building with the man widely known as Australia's Earthship guru: rammed-tyre earth walls, thermal-mass design, and the whole-of-house systems thinking that makes Earthships work off the grid.
Traditional earth building with a teacher specializing in natural building techniques like cast-in-situ hemp walls, clay/lime plasters, and Tadelakt: learn it by doing it. Time-proven techniques for working structural earth by hand.
In keeping with how we do everything: we're students of this craft before we're teachers of it. Diverse Routes workshops pass on what was learned at the source — and run alongside proven practitioners while our own track record grows.
Dreaming, planning, or already owner-building? Tell me where you're at and I'll match you to the right workshop.
scameron@diverseroutes.com.au