This is a CTP of initiative: Ecovillage Sieben Linden (Germany)
The ‘radical sustainable living experiment’, the neighbourhood ‘Club 99’ started experimenting with local building material and straw in 2000. It caused a kick-off of this newly re-discovered construction technique. A few years later the first two straw bale houses in Sieben Linden could be successfully completed. It followed the foundation of the ‘German National Organisation of Straw Bale Building’ (FASBA) in 2002 and after official fire tests the acceptance of straw in the German building law in 2006.
Sieben Linden ecovillage has experimented and elaborated on straw bale building. The first two straw bale houses that have been built in the ecovillage have brought a breakthrough for this building technique in Sieben Linden, in Germany and even further.
In an application for an award, the pioneers of Sieben Linden straw bale construction have written in 2006:
“Without the straw-bale-building-activities in Sieben Linden, straw-bale-building in Germany would still be an absolutely marginal idea. Thanks to the activities of Sieben Linden and FASBA [The German national organisation of straw bale building], straw-bale-building is now accepted in Germany as a sustainable way of building that has an official approval as a building-material”. (Wiegand, Stengl, Scharmer: Ecovillage Sieben Linden with Straw Bale construction. Submission to the World Habitat Awards, Building and Social Housing Foundation, 2006)
Straw bale building started in Sieben Linden in 1998 with two pioneers of the 1999 founded neighbourhood of ‘Club99’ and later the ‘Einfach Gut Leben e.V.’ association. They wanted to know more about the practical realisation and invited David Eisenberg, one of the American straw bale building pioneers and Harald Wedig from the Netherlands to give a presentation of their works.
In 2000 the neighbourhood ‘Club 99’ began to experiment with different techniques of straw and clay building and with ecological and local construction processes in general.
From 2001 on the group started with building their communal dwelling house, the ‘Villa Strohbunt’, which took three years to finish. ‘Villa Strohbunt’ was one of the first legal straw bale-constructions in Germany and the first one in the Ecovillage Sieben Linden.
The building project turned out as one of the main innovations for the straw bale construction in Germany. It contributed significantly to the popularity of Sieben Linden at the same time. Through the realization and experiences of ‘Villa Strohbunt’, the pioneers hereby introduced the idea of constructing houses with straw bales into Sieben Linden. Learning from this pioneering experiment the co-operative started to build the largest straw bale house in Europe at that time: the 550 sqm three floor residential building for 20 people, called ‘Strohpolis’, which was finished in early 2005.
‘Villa Strohbunt’, 100 sqm, had been the niche experiment, handmade, labor-intense with lots of voluntary work and idealism. With planning and building ‘Strohpolis’, Sieben Linden started to made a clear step for multiplying this way of constructing ecological houses.
To explain the emergence and breakthrough of this CTP, the ‘Villa Strohbunt’ construction process shall be briefly introduced. For the pioneers of ‘Club 99’ ‘Villa Strohbunt’ was an expression to realise the ecological and ethical convictions in a consequent and holistic way:
“Villa Strohbund and the two domes were designed and constructed with the goal to show the possibilities of radically reducing the ecological footprint of fulfilling the human need for housing by combining traditional and modern knowledge. A first simple footprint analysis shows that the whole construction process needed less than 5% of the average energy input compared to standard ecological house building in Germany. The framework was made of round timber, cut from the own forest by hand, pulled to the construction site by horses and assembled completely by hand with the use of traditional tools. All work on the construction site has been done by human power such as hands and feet and electrical or motorized tools have only been used for transportation vehicles for the foundation stones, the straw bales and clay. Walls, floor (!) and upper ceiling are built with straw bales from the first organic harvest of the fields of Sieben Linden and surroundings. The clay and the sand come directly from the grounds of Sieben Linden. All other non-regenerative materials like windows, roof tiles, heating devices, and pipes... were regionally recycled.” (Wiegand, Stengl, Scharmer: Ecovillage Sieben Linden with Straw Bale construction. Sumission to the World Habitat Awards, Building and Social Housing Foundation, 2006).
For realising this technical innovation, an idealistic community was the fundament. ‘Club 99’ had agreed on a social-ecological way of living including practices like radical local consumption, self-sufficiency and shared economy. The mostly young people have attracted hundreds of voluntary workers during the three years of construction. They were attracted to learn from this experiment, to experience community, and to feel part of an innovative social-ecological experiment and adventure.
Sieben Linden had become frontrunner in straw bale construction. Nevertheless, in all cases it wasn’t easy to get a building permission, so in summer 2002 a group of people decided to establish an association with the aim to encourage the straw bale building in Germany.
The 'German Straw Bale Building Association' (FASBA) was founded in 2002 in Sieben Linden to make possible and promote this construction method. In a few years FASBA has grown to 150 members with two branches one in Sieben Linden and one in the City of Lueneburg. FASBA has initiated several research studies and test.
In cooperation with the laboratory of the university of Braunschweig, an official fire test of a straw-clay wall was done and proofed. This finally resulted in the acceptance of straw in the German building law in 2006.
Later FASBA moved from Sieben Linden to the ‘German competence centre for sustainable building’ in Verden near Bremen. Sieben Linden has lost its paramount position of the centre of straw bale education in Germany. Still, it is following the straw bale house construction work intensely for its own growth and stays the place in Germany where most straw bale houses are located. The following seven residential houses, each of 200 to 400 sqm have been built in Sieben Linden in straw bale-clay technique between 2006 and 2017: ‘Brunnenwiese’ in 2007, Windrose und Villa Communia in 2008, Libelle in 2010, Nachtigall in 2014, Kranich in 2015 and Einhorn in 2017.
A major co-productive aspect to realise the innovative experiment of ‘Villa Strohbunt’ – and also of ‘Strohpolis’ to a smaller amount – was community, idealism and voluntary work.
“The housing concept is integrated into the idea of building communities with and for people that wish to take their lives into their own hands. In this case, the whole design including all details was made by the inhabitants-to-be by themselves; professionalists were only needed for technical consultation. In the case of Villa Strohbund helping guests stayed for about 2.000 person-days working and living with the members of the neighbourhood. The costs for all materials including transporting them was less than 5.000 EUR out of which less than 2.000 EUR for material coming from outside of the ecovillage. The whole costs for Villa Strohbund and the two domes were only 25.000 EUR covering all expenses for planning and the building permission, construction materials and helping hands from outside the community.” (Wiegand, Stengl, Scharmer: Ecovillage Sieben Linden with Straw Bale construction. Sumission to the World Habitat Awards, Building and Social Housing Foundation, 2006)
The co-operative (Wohnungsgenossenschaft Sieben Linden) gave the impulse to design ‘Strohpolis’ and has also financed it as well as five of the other seven residential straw bale houses which have been built later.
Sieben Linden was not alone or isolated with its experiments of Straw Bale houses. Since ‘Strohpolis’, they cooperate with external architects till today. In connection with two other straw bale buildings in Germany in 1998 and 2000 these four houses formed the roots of all German straw bale building activities.
Sieben Linden has networked internationally with initiatives in the US, Denmark, Scotland, Estonia, Croatia and others via the ‘Global Ecovillage Network’ (GEN). For instance, later courses of ‘Ecovillage Design Education’ (EDE) had taken place in Sieben Linden, showing straw bale construction as a fundamental building technique also to guests from the global South, mainly Africa. Sieben Linden was providing experiential learning for international groups and national environmental organisations, offered consultations and tours of the buildings.
In 2006, Sieben Linden was under the winners of the World Habitat Award of the Building and Social Housing Foundation for its two first straw bale houses including a support for the third house, the ‘Brunnenwiese’.
The most important milestone is the obtainment of a general approval of straw bales as an insulation material in the German building law in February 2006. It’s the first general approval to straw-bales as a building-material in Europe. This change of government policy is a very important step for this way of construction not only for Germany. As Germany is internationally known for its strict building-regulations, the fact that straw-bales are an approved building-material in Germany has a positive influence for the role of straw-bale-building all over the world.
Start of experimenting with straw bales and clay for buildings in Sieben Linden (2000)
Foundation of ‘German National Organisation of straw bale building’ (FASBA) (2002)
Completion of the experimental and hand-made strawbale house ‘‘Villa Strohbunt’’ (2004) after three years
Completion of largest strawbale house in Europe at that time: the three floor residential house ‘strohpolis’ (2005)
Fire test of straw-clay wall in the laboratory of the university of Braunschweig and general approval of straw bales as an insulation material in the Germany building law (February 2006)
In 2008 the head quarter of the ‘National Organisation of straw bale building’ was moved to the German competence centre for sustainable building in Verden near Bremen
Sieben Linden has built seven residential houses, each of 200 to 400 sqm in straw bale-clay technique between 2006 and 2017: ‘Brunnenwiese’ in 2007, Windrose und Villa Communia in 2008, Libelle in 2010, Nachtigall in 2014, Kranich in 2015 and Einhorn in 2017.
The ‘German National Organisation of straw bale building’ (FASBA) was founded in 2002 in Sieben Linden Ecovillage. The head quarter of the FASBA association was moved in 2008 to the ‘German competence centre for sustainable building’ in Verden near Bremen.
This development did not involve a contestation between the two locations. In Sieben Linden no person was ready to manage the project in Sieben Linden. The main actors, leading experts and architects were located in Lüneburg and elsewhere. Another crucial reason was the marginal, rural location of Sieben Linden, lacking accessibility for one-day seminar guests as well as an adequate internet access.
Still, it was regretted by Sieben Linden in term of business opportunities, as the Straw bale education centre would have brought an increase in attention and sales for the existing education centre in Sieben Linden. However, it is rather seen as releasing today, that the centre did not come, because the guest streams of the education centre are perceived as intense enough.
Sieben Linden was founded as an ecovillage project to be built up from scratch. The intention in the beginning was to grow actually into a village with 300 residents by building new eco-houses on the 20ha large building site. After 20 years eleven houses have been built. A third of the 140 residents is still living in trailer homes and the community has agreed upon an organic, slow growth. Straw bale construction is established as the major method for building the houses in the ecovillage of Sieben Linden. How many houses are built does not primarily depend on the building technology or the finances but rather on the community building, social readiness and engagement of building groups. The idea was to build every year a new house, which did not work out so far. However, seven houses have been built since 2005.
The pioneers of ‘Club 99’ had aimed at constructing more houses in a radical ecological way without machines. They had lived without electricity for some years. After finishing ‘Villa Strohbunt’ it turned out that compromises needed to be made to realise the large ‘Strohpolis’ house. While the construction practices have still fulfilled general eco-building standards it was much less ecologically done than ‘Villa Strohbunt’. The main reason was that Sieben Linden could not manage to build another, larger house in the same labour intense way. The later straw bale buildings could not reach the high ecological idealism like ‘Villa Strohbunt’ anymore, and still proof high level eco-standards in comparison to the German average of eco-housing.
Through Sieben Linden straw bale building technology had grown from a niche experiment to the German building law. It was an ongoing process, although it was not foreseen. The experimentation in the beginning was done in a self-made and experimental way. The neighbourhood ‘Club 99’ as pioneers of straw bale construction aimed at living radical ecological without harming nature and humans. They intended to live without electricity and machines, but with a high degree of self-sufficiency. The technology has been applied in many other cases of ecological building in Germany.
In terms of ecological results, a study on the ecological impact of ecovillages has shown that Sieben Linden consumes less than 10% of the German average of energy per person in the area of housing. In the areas of housing, mobility and food the ecological footprint of ecovillages is 28-42% of the German average (study: Simon et al., 2004)
During Villa Strohbunt was built, hundreds of people came to Sieben Linden to learn how to build with straw and clay. For Sieben Linden it was a learning process to handle this popularity and finally accept being not able to manage the next step of straw bale education centre. They have learnt to present their work at conferences and in the media worldwide, how to provide education and practical experience for visitors and interested groups (during the building process there were at least 500 helping and learning guests from all over the world). Also practical examples for including social aspects on working sites for professionals have been important (Wiegand, Stengl, Scharmer: Ecovillage Sieben Linden with Straw Bale construction. Sumission to the World Habitat Awards, Building and Social Housing Foundation, 2006)
Although the voluntary work is not the major part to build a house any more in Sieben Linden and the houses have become less ‘creative’, the co-operative has established that all members – their number has grown to almost one hundred over the years – help with some voluntary hours when a new house is built till today.
The official approval of the straw bale construction in 2006 in the German building law did not simplify the permission processes of the following house projects in Sieben Linden. The construction technique has been further developed very quickly and every plan needs a single permission.
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