Day 7: Earthships

For our next trick we traveled to Taos, New Mexico to visit the Greater World Earthship Biotecture Headquarters. In the high desert where only sagebrush can survive, the Earthship crew is building radically self-sufficient houses capable of supporting not only humans, but entire tiny ecosystems. By integrating the natural environment into the living areas, the Earthships can grow foods that would be unable to thrive in the Taos Plateau. A notable example is banana trees, which are often shipped thousands of miles from the plantation to the table. In Earthships, bananas grow in entryways and living rooms.

While in Taos, we had the good fortune of visiting our friend Joe who is currently part of the Earthships Academy. He was able to give us an informal tour of the current builds as well as acting as our ticket to "backstage Earthships". Getting to meet and hangout with the students who will be taking Earthships all over the world was amazingly insightful as to why these dwellings are so important.

Earthships act in much the same way food banks do, but instead of redistributing surplus food they repurpose surplus trash. Fortunately for the Earthship team (and unfortunately for the planet) there is endless garbage to work with like old tires, cans and glass bottles. Phil, who has been part of the Earthship team since the formative days, taught us about glomming, the act and art of finessing garbage into usable building material.

New America?

A happy camper

Spot the liquor bottle

Non-obtrusive architecture

Earthship academy students at the newest build site

Inside a current build (Eve)

Dinner being cooked