Product category:
Building Energy Efficiency and Sustainability
News Release from: amazonails | Subject: Grand Designs Eco Home of 2008
Edited by the Buildingtalk Editorial
Team on 19 May 2008
Strawbale home is Grand Designs Eco Home
of 2008
A strawbale home in Wales which amazonails helped design and build was voted Grand Designs Eco Home of 2008 during the recent Grand Designs Live exhibition and associated Channel 4 TV programmes.
The house, called Penwhilwr and located in St Dogmael's, Wales, is a two-storey load-bearing strawbale structure with curved walls It was the first two-storey load-bearing strawbale structure to be built in the UK and only the second in Europe
This article was originally published on Buildingtalk on 30 Jan 2008 at 8.00am (UK)
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The design brief, set by owner Rachel Shiamh, was to build a beautiful, low impact strawbale home which had to be sensitive to its natural environment, self-sustaining and made from natural and mainly local materials.
An off-grid power supply system was specified, to be powered by sun and wind, and fuelled by its own woodland, with all waste to be composted on site through an Aquatron system.
The strawbale walls, with a u value of only 0.13, together with thermafleece in the cedar shingled roof, provide extraordinary insulation.
Only a single wood burner using coppiced wood is required for heating.
The solar panels, thermal system and wind turbine supply all other energy requirements on a 24v system.
Natural materials are used throughout - the floors are timber and other natural materials including slate, glaster, limecrete and earth, with leca insulation.
The strawbale walls are rendered with lime and clay.
All timber was locally sourced.
Todmorden, West Yorkshire based social enterprise amazonails is the UK's leading strawbale designer, consultancy and trainer, with over 100 strawbale buildings completed in Britain, including the largest in the UK.
The latter, a fine art auction room and offices for G E Sworder and Sons, was officially opened by Princess Michael of Kent at Stansted Mountfitchet, Essex, on 8 May.
Barbara Jones, founder and director of amazonails, said: "The choice of a strawbale home as Eco Home of the Year is yet another proof that strawbale building is becoming more and more accepted as a viable mainstream construction technique which has overwhelming ecological advantages".
Commenting on her Welsh home, Rachel Shiamh said, "It serves as an example for living lightly and sustainably on the planet in these changing times".
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