Inner City Farmer

I had a tough choice to make this weekend: attend Dick Pierce’s Organic Gardening class or Tempe Sikora’s Earthen Plaster workshop. As much as my garden needs tending—actually, “resuscitation” is probably a better word—the timing of Tempe’s class was just too perfect. Having already gutted the inside of the future Man Cave, I’ve been eager to start working on its interior. The fact that I have yet to fully plaster all the cob projects I’ve done also speaks to the urgency of my learning this craft.

So what did I learn in Tempe’s class? Well, this whole time I’ve been struggling with lime plaster when earthen plaster would probably have been a better choice. The biggest difference between the two is that with earthen plaster you get to use your hands just like with cob. Having to use a trowel to apply lime plaster really slows me down. Don’t get me wrong. I still want to work with lime plaster. It’s better at resisting the eroding forces of water, making it the more lasting option. I just think right now earthen plaster is probably a better option for me.

Here’s what the wall in the picture above looked like after we applied a base coat of earthen plaster to it:

So much better, right? And that only took a couple hours. After the next coat or two, it will look even better.

One of the more exciting things I learned was how to make a natural paint that can be applied directly to drywall. Here’s what that looks like:

Notice the texture it gives the wall (Okay, you can’t really see it, but, trust me, it does.). Because it’s got more body you can use it to create all sorts of interesting elements to the interior walls of your house. Here are some examples of what’s possible:

All in all, it was great day. I learned a ton and met some great people. I can’t wait to start using all that I learned!

Tags: earthen plaster, Tempe Sikora

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 24th, 2008 at 7:16 pm and is filed under Building with Cob, Natural Building. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.