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Build a wattle and daub house.

Ranked #789 in Home & Garden, #13,043 overall

You could make your own building out of sticks and mud!

Wattle and daub (also referred to as 'ruddle and dab' and 'wattle and dab') is sort of like papier mache for living in. It's something strong and serviceable built of something unlikely.

In Europe, the framework of wattle and daub begins with a timber-framed house. The large spaces between timbers is grooved - splines are inserted vertically in the grooves, parallel to each other. Then thin reeds or splits are woven back and forth between the splines. This provides a framework for mud (daub) which is pressed in from both sides against the woven wood. It all dries together into a solid mass and then is generally whitewashed with a lime solution.

When I decided to get my donkey Jethro, I really wanted to build his shed using this technique and did a lot of reading about it. Our soil is clay and would probably be good for "daub."

However, I was afraid that our frequently humid and wet climate might cause the walls to deteriorate quickly. Also, the giant hole that would be created by digging out the clay seemed like quite a problem. So I regretfully gave up on the idea.

Bulgarian buildings old and new show woven sticks and mud - or brick and mud - between timbers.

I had the chance to take some pictures of wattle and daub houses when I was in Bulgaria a couple years ago. It's fascinating to see the houses in deshabille - because their construction is so clear.



Bulgarian revival architecture is very hip among the wealthy in Bulgaria now, which means they are spending a lot of money to refurbish old buildings and, amazingly, to build new ones in the traditional style. My daughter and I saw many craftspeople doing work as exquisite as anything from the past. Here is a picture of what the framework looks like before the wattle is added:

bulgarian national revival architecture building framework/

Here are a couple more pictures I took with construction details. Click them for much greater detail.



What is coppicing?

The wood used in wattle construction was usually from coppiced groves.

Coppicing is a way to renew trees rapidly. If you have cut down youngish trees you know that many little stems shoot up from the stump almost immediately; in a year or two there will be many small trees growing out of the stump.

Around my place, this is cause for irritation and maybe the application of Roundup. But that's because I have tons of trees. In Merrye Olde England trees were in short supply; coppicing a tree was an efficient way to force it to grow more rapidly and provide more wood for charcoal or withies.

Typically a coppiced woodland is harvested in sections on rotation.

Wikipedia: "Coppicing maintains trees at a juvenile stage, and a regularly coppiced tree will never die of old age - some coppice stools may therefore reach immense ages. The age of a stool may be estimated from its diameter, and some are so large (perhaps as much as 9 m or 30 ft across) that they are thought to have been continuously coppiced for centuries."

Hurdle making with wattle

From AllotmentForestry.com: What is a wattle hurdle?

Fence panels of woven 'green' Hazel and Willow have been used for centuries. They are the ideal instant windbreak, less likely to blow down than sawn-lap panels, and give an attractive rustic appearance... As they age they become brittle and you need to securely erect them to reduce flexing damage.


You can see fences like this occasionally even in not-medieval towns like mine.

Online resources for wattle and daub construction

Wattle & Daub: Craft, Conservation & Wiltshire Case Study
A dissertation submitted by Tony Graham towards the degree of Master of Science in the Conservation of Historic Buildings at the University of Bath. Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering.

Very detailed, construction diagrams, materials, conservation, etc. He wrote with this diagram: "The tops of all staves were prepared to fit the underside of the rail. For an augered hole, they were roughly pointed by chamfering on all four sides or chamfered on just two sides to fit the width of a mortice. The bottoms were shaped to fit the groove in the lower rail by chamfering the front and back to almost a point, and the sides just slightly chamfered to allow the stave to be swung more easily into position"

Relocation of Winkhurst Farm and Reinterpretation as a Tudor Kitchen

Winkhurst Farm ... arrived at Singleton in January 1968 - the first building acquired by the Museum...

In October 1986 a major programme of repairs to the building was carried out, during which various observations were made that enabled to us to propose a completely different interpretation: that it was originally built in the early 16th century (dendrochronological analysis suggests a date in the range 1492-1537) ...

Etowah State Park's Wattle & Daub House (state of Georgia in the U.S.)

Modern-day construction using Native American techniques: "In the spring and summer of 2008, American Indians, Etowah staff and volunteers constructed a wattle and daub house utilizing an original archaeological floor plan of a house that was at Etowah around 1250 to 1325 A.D. It was constructed of upright posts with woven green cane (wattle) between each. Daub made of Georgia red clay was mixed with grass and water and "daubed" to the wattle."


The Cleft Wood Company Traditional Building Materials

"All our products are hand made in the traditional way and will maintain the character and integrity of a building"....

Riven oak laths (traditional base for lime plaster). ... Riven oak roofing battens... Oak staves (for wattle & daub) ... Split hazel (for wattle and daub) .



I Love Cob!
Cob is the building of walls out of mud, it's closely related to wattle and daub. There is wonderful info on this site: "I Love Cob! The magical mixture of mud, sand and straw mixed with human hands..."

Vitruvius, Roman architect, criticizes this building technique.

You can't please everybody...

As for "wattle and daub" I could wish that it had never been invented. The more it saves in time and gains in space, the greater and the more general is the disaster that it may cause; for it is made to catch fire, like torches.

It seems better, therefore, to spend on walls of burnt brick, and be at expense, than to save with "wattle and daub," and be in danger.

And, in the stucco [plaster] covering, too, it makes cracks from the inside by the arrangement of its studs and girts [rails]. For these swell with moisture as they are daubed, and then contract as they dry, and, by their shrinking, cause the solid stucco to split.

But since some are obliged to use it either to save time or money, or for partitions on an unsupported span, the proper method of construction is as follows. Give it a high foundation so that it may nowhere come in contact with the broken stone-work composing the floor; for if it is sunk in this, it rots in course of time, then settles and sags forward, and so breaks through the surface of the stucco covering.'

Poplar Cottage from Washington, Sussex

At the "Weald and Downland Open Air Museum"

This building was probably the home of a landless labourer from the mid 17th century. A timber framed cottage, two rooms on each floor, with an end smoke bay, an early form of chimney.

The building was moved from its original location to the museum. During dismantling, ecologist Ruth Tittensor took a close interest in the cottage, and took samples of organic materials, amongst them some ash staves from the wattle and daub panels with original 17th century lichen still adhering to the bark.

The Weald museum website discusses the method of rebuilding. Here are some pictures from the re-wattling of the building!

Weaving of oak splits.





Why did the English stop building with daub and wattle?

From Tony Graham's thesis

The demise of the craft of daubing was driven by several compounding factors.

Firstly was the replacement with brick nogging.

Secondly, timber framing, using either new or reused timbers, diminished during the 17th and 18th centuries due to the inherent fire risk and the subsequent move to stone and brick: construction of half-timbered buildings had almost ceased by the turn of the 18th century.

Thirdly, as half-timbering became less respectable through the 18th century Palladians' desire for stone or brick façades, timber walls were frequently modernised by full plastering or by hiding behind mathematical tiles.

In all buildings, a disadvantage of wattle and daub has always been its vulnerability to damp. If not kept dry, the wattles would rot or be attacked by beetles and the daub would crack and lose key due to wetting and frost.

The effects of rain were retarded by the usual limewash finish but could be further reduced by finishing the panel with a lime plaster. This provided a more robust surface and sealed the cracks in the underlying daub.

However, the inherent flexibility of the frame and the shrinkage of earth and lime materials meant that not even the finest work could seal the joint between panel and its surrounding frame. Compared to masonry walls, wattle and daub buildings were draughty and the panels required frequent repair or renewal.

The poor image of wattle and daub was even conveyed through law: it is said that the term 'breaking and entering' comes from the ease with which criminals were able to enter a building by breaking through the infill.

What is brick nogging?

From "A Treatise On Architecture And Building Construction," 1899, Colliery Engineering Co.

Stud partitions in brick buildings, and the space between the outside studs in wooden houses, are often filled in with brickwork, to obstruct as much as possible the passage of fire, sound, and vermin. As there is no special weight placed on the brick, the cheapest kind of brick may be used for this purpose, such as the pale or salmon brick from the outer portion of a brick kiln. The brick should be laid in mortar as in a 4-inch brick wall.

When the wall is lathed with wooden laths, there should be a small space left between the brick nogging and the lath, so that the plaster will have a sufficient clinch behind the lathing.

If a stud partition rests on the capping of a partition below it on another story, the space between the floor and the ceiling below may be filled with brick nogging.

I took the picture in Bulgaria, where we saw timber-framed buildings with the interstices filled with "whatever" - sometimes woven sticks and clay, sometimes bricks, sometimes stones and rubble, sometimes a combination of all three!

Paula Sunshine's book on Wattle and Daub at Amazon

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From Paula Sunshine's book: "Close studding"

This is just one example of the wonderful information she provides

Building a bamboo-framed wattle and daub technique

Exterior - one of several in this series

Wattle and daub- Manipur
by zenrainman | video info

5 ratings | 6,289 views
curated content from YouTube

Build an interior wall using bamboo wattle-and-daub

From the same project (above)

Walls
by ittanmomen123 | video info

4 ratings | 13,935 views
curated content from YouTube

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The wattle and daub bar and grill section of town

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