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The China Folk House in Harpers Ferry showcases traditional Chinese architecture, bringing together a diverse community through a remarkable preservation project

Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, is the last place you’d expect to see a traditional Chinese homestead. But that’s just what you’ll find at China Folk House, a traditional structure that a team of preservation-minded students brought over from Yunnan province and rebuilt in their own backyard.

Built spoke to educator John Flower, vice chair and co-founder of the China Folk House, about this monumental endeavor and the surprising ways the house is bringing a diverse community together.

A Surprising Encounter

Flower first encountered the house on a trip to China with his students. “I was doing a semester-long program in Dali, in northwest Yunnan,” he said. “We lived in an old courtyard house, and we would just study local architecture and temples, and we had the kids apprentice with craftsmen. It was pretty amazing.”

As part of the trip, Flower and his students would travel throughout the region. Passing through an area by the Mekong River that would soon be covered by flooding due to the construction of a new dam, they met a local.

“I said to him, ‘Oh man, it’s a shame your house is going to be flooded. I wish I could just take it home with me,’ just being polite,” Flower explained. “And he said, ‘OK, well, we can do that.” It was a surprising idea, but Flower was immediately on board.

The house being rebuilt in West Virginia.

While the house was hand built using traditional construction techniques, it wasn’t as it seemed. “It’s a beautiful thing, but it’s very folky. It’s real folk architecture, folk craft, but it’s not old,” Flower said. “So the wood is in really good condition, and it’s typical. I’ve had people from Yunnan come and they’re like, ‘Oh my God—this is walking into my grandmother’s house. It wasn’t anything special and that’s what I liked about it. It was just an ordinary house of an ordinary person.”

Bringing Down the House

Flower used to work as a stonemason, moving old log cabins across Virginia, so he knew it was possible. He also knew that in China, traditional architecture was designed to be disassembled and moved as needed.

“Every generation or so you would rebuild your family house, usually on the same site,” he explained. “You would recycle what you could, and then expand it to accommodate a growing family. That was their tradition.”

Flower got together a group of colleagues and former students, one of whom was an architecture student who made a 3D model of the house. “I did lots of interviewing about the process of building, and how it was done originally, and different aspects of the community history and the family history,” Flower said.

The group also hired four workers from the Bai ethnic group, which had a long tradition of mortise and tenon construction. The group disassembled the house in just four days.

“Everything is done by either floating panels or mortise and tenon, so you just got to take it apart and do it step by step,” Flower said. “First we took out all the walls and the floors, and then we took the tile roof off and then all the rafters. Then all that was up were these four post and beam bents. We lowered them down and took them apart, wrapped everything up, and it all fit into one truck.”

Packed into a shipping container along with the house’s traditional furniture, the structure was ready to make the long trip to the United States. But would they be able to put it back together once it arrived?

Putting the Puzzle Back Together

One of the reasons that Flower and his team were able to reassemble the house was that it was built using traditional mortise and tenon construction methods.

“In traditional Western timber framing, there are lots of diagonal braces, and there are pegs that go and secure tenons that are slipped into mortises,” Flower said. “Here, they don’t have any diagonals. They have a double mortise. They have a mortise inside the mortise that has a kind of dovetail flange inside the joint. So there’s no diagonal braces at all in the structure, which makes the whole thing fit together like a puzzle. No pegs, just joinery.”

When the house got back to West Virginia, it was met by volunteers from the West Virginia Timber Framers Guild, who spent two weeks putting the frame back together.

“They thought it was fascinating,” Flower said. “It was just exactly what they do, but a different method, and the West Virginia guys had never seen anything like it. They were thanking me. They were volunteering for two weeks, but they were thanking me the whole time for bringing them such a cool kind of project.”

The original house.

Once the frame was in place, Flower’s students got in on the action. “Most of the work, honestly, was done by kids,” he said. “We did a building camp for five years, and they absolutely loved it. They learned how to do stone masonry. We had guys from the Timber Framer Guild who taught them how to do timber framing. It just kind of grew by word of mouth, and we’d have 90 kids coming over the course of a summer.”

Flower said his students loved working on the house. “All year round, all they get is external affirmation of grades and working on computers. It’s great for them to do something with their hands, and they get to be part of something bigger than themselves. Some of them come back year after year and they’ll point to stuff and say, ‘I built that.”

A Community Endeavor

Flower said that one of the best parts of building the house is how it’s been received by the community.

“That’s really been the most gratifying thing,” he said. “Local people just wander up there. And then it’s just all these people from China who are just so moved that we cared enough about a piece of their culture that we would go to the trouble of moving it, and they’ve been awesome.”

Flower said the house has won itself some surprising fans. “West Virginia is super red [politically], but even people who come out who normally wouldn’t interact with Chinese culture, they don’t see it as China. They see it as something that’s built by people like them.”

Bringing the community together is, as Flower said, “what we’re all about.”

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Ensemble/Mosaic's ambitious master plan for the Philadelphia Navy Yard includes a $1 billion diversity pledge and the creation of a LEED-certified neighborhood

The Philadelphia Navy Yard’s master plan was developed by Ensemble/Mosaic. The plan is taking root across 1,200 acres, with more than 30 acres devoted to park space and 6.3 miles of a waterfront habitat that is home to more than 2,000 trees and wildlife.

The development is called AVE Navy Yard, and it is comprised of two buildings, AVE Normandy and AVE Constitution. Currently the development has two residential buildings going up which will be home to more than 1,000 residents, with plans upon full build out to have approximately 4,000 residential units which will be home to more than 6,000 residents

In 2023, the Navy Yard’s first speculative multi-tenant research and development lab building opened. Designed to be the most advanced building of its kind in the Philadelphia region, at four stories and 137,000 square feet, 1201 Normandy is optimized for cell and gene therapy companies and has the flexibility to accommodate a variety of life science and biotech users. 

Brian Cohen, managing director, Ensemble Investments, said the company wanted to ensure that what it was doing was going to be impactful for the city of Philadelphia and the surrounding neighborhoods. The company focused on a robust strategy and thought about which firms and individuals were designing, engineering, constructing, operating and managing its projects, as well as which firms and individuals would be occupying the site. 

$1 billion diversity pledge

Ensemble/Mosaic rooted its master plan in a $1 billion diversity pledge, including a promise to use minority-owned or women-owned enterprises for 20% of its equity investment.

“It was really looking at real estate as its whole lifecycle and thinking about how we could be inclusive and create opportunities for minorities, women and veterans in all aspects of our project,” Cohen said. “We committed to 40% of the companies that we engage with in the design and preprofessional services of our developments would be minority owned, woman owned, veteran owned disabled in construction.”

Ensemble/Mosaic’s goal is that 50% of those companies that are working on and constructing its buildings would be minority women and veteran owned disabled companies. 

It is likely to become more challenging to put some of those requirements in place once tenants arrive, however. “What we’ve committed to is that related to our retail space on the ground floors of our building, we would reserve 25% of our retail space for retailers that are owned by minority women or veterans,” Cohen said. “And we’d offer those at subsidized lease terms so that we could provide opportunities in a prime location for companies and individuals that might not otherwise have the opportunity to locate in a new neighborhood location.”

Since Ensemble/Mosaic started that program in the middle of 2020, it has committed in contracts to approximately $100 million to minority women and veteran-owned companies.

Ensemble/Mosaic also created a foundation that has surpassed $1 million. Met Foundation is dedicated to the education and empowerment of minorities, women and veterans. “Two percent of the net cash flow of everything we develop at the Navy Yard gets donated to that foundation,” Cohen said. “It has an ongoing sustainable source of revenue for everything from workforce training to low-interest loans, grants for minority women and veterans that either live, work, locate at or work on projects at the Navy Yard.”

Ensemble/Mosaic extended that into ownership as well. Mosaic is a minority- and woman-owned company. “When we look to our investors and how we capitalize and finance projects, we are taking that into account,” Cohen said. “On our residential project—a $285 million project—we had $110 million of that that was a minority-led investment by Basis out of New York, a minority- and woman-owned firm. They both invested in the project and then identified and led the rest of that investment for $110 million.”

Sustainability and DEI

All this is being done with a foundational value of sustainability and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) that the developers hope will serve as a model for other large-scale developments.

Nine Ensemble/Mosaic buildings at the Navy Yard are Silver-Platinum LEED Certified and the developers intend to create Philadelphia’s first LEED-certified neighborhood, with every building being LEED Silver or above. In addition, Ensemble/Mosaic has pledged that its $2.6 billion investment in the Navy Yard is committed to environmental, social and governance (ESG) principles.

“The environment contributes more greenhouse gases than any other industry that exists, more than the automobile industry,” Cohen said. “We thought about how we have as much positive impact as possible; developing sustainably was really important,” Cohen said. “We also know that it’s important to our customers and our various stakeholders and so we committed to utilizing LEED.”

Every building the company develops has a minimum of LEED Silver, with most of its buildings having achieved LEED Gold or LEED Platinum certification. “Most recently, we’ve embarked on going through LEED neighborhood development and certifying the Navy Yard as a LEED MD project, which looks beyond the building and to the community,” Cohen said. “It looks to infrastructure, public space, and it looks to health and wellness and making sure that we’re developing responsibly; that we’re thinking about the health and wellness of our occupants, and we’re trying to minimize the impact that we have on the environment and reduce our carbon footprint as much as possible.”

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See how Burmor Construction used Bluebeam to improve accuracy, reduce delays and enhance client collaboration

When contractor Burmor Construction needed to accurately price a residential development, Bluebeam was the obvious choice.

Elliot Road is a residential development project comprising 30 new dwellings. It involved clearing an existing site and infilling new homes. To help the team coordinate the project effectively, Burmor used Bluebeam.

The tool provided huge time savings during both design and construction. During design, it made the process of measuring the different elements of the project very easy, and in construction it helped the project team and client to make faster decisions.

Designing with digital tools

Sam Harwin, senior quantity surveyor at Burmor, had been using Bluebeam for several years. When he joined the company, it was something he was keen to roll out.

“One of the biggest benefits is that it makes measurement so easy to do,” Harwin said. “That helps us to accurately price our jobs and order the right number of materials. We try to do everything digitally, and then export the measurements to Microsoft Excel to build the bill of quantities.”

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As well as improving measurement, Bluebeam helped speed up design and reduce costs. For example, the team no longer needed to print multiple large drawings and complete markups by hand, which is time consuming and runs the risk of mistakes. This has led to a reduction in paper usage and has removed the need to purchase expensive printers. The team has even been able to reduce the size of its workspace.

Using software on site

During construction Bluebeam also helped the team to work on the project remotely, increasing approval speeds and avoiding delays.

Harwin said: “We had an issue on site when we cleared some vegetation. We found a boundary wall that was damaged. Instead of the client having to come to site and look before deciding, we digitally marked up the drawing, added a comment to explain what we’d found and then attached some photos. 

“This was all added to an email, with the client able to respond that day,” Harwin said. “In the past, something like that might have delayed a decision by up to a week, potentially causing a knock-on effect with other tasks.”

Increasing business efficiency

Using tools like Bluebeam is part of a wider strategy at Burmor to use technology to improve efficiencies.

“Like most businesses, we utilize Office 365 and OneDrive for our projects, with secure folders set up to share the latest documentation with clients and our supply chain partners,” Harwin said. “We’ve just started using drones to carry out site surveys too, allowing us to quickly review project progress.”

“While these are all useful, you also need tools that are specific to construction. Bluebeam is very versatile. It’s easy to use, is always up to date with the latest versions of documents and helps us to visually explain projects to our clients.”

“For example, we had to move some doors early in the design. It was easy to markup the drawing during the meeting, with the client able to decide there and then.”

Benefits for small contractors

To achieve benefits of any new software, construction businesses need to ensure they invest time and effort into the rollout process, according to Harwin.

“My advice to SMEs is that no matter what size you are, there is software that can help,” Harwin said. “Many construction businesses are doing the same thing and have similar needs—it might just be that for an SME this is on a smaller scale.” “We have found that software empowers smaller businesses to deliver work themselves that in the past they have had to go elsewhere for. We showed a bricklayer how to use Bluebeam’s measurement tool to help calculate the number of bricks they needed. Traditionally, they may have asked for QS support or discussed drawings with the architect, but they can do that themselves now using tools like Bluebeam.”

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The construction sector uses a lot of water, not least in the manufacture of essential materials like concrete and mortar. As the world confronts a looming climate crisis, what does the industry need to do to manage its water usage more effectively when delivering the homes and other buildings society needs?

As well as one of life’s “essentials,” water is a crucial element in a variety of industrial processes, not least construction.

To the casual observer, the only visible evidence of construction site water use might be a worker hosing down a truck full of construction waste to prevent the escape of dust.

But lots of water is used in many aspects of construction and in a variety of ways.

Amid a climate change crisis and the increasing threat – and instance – of drought, the sector is looking at ways to improve water efficiency in construction projects, as well as doing more to source what it does use responsibly while striving to minimize waste and leaks.

How much water is used in construction?

According to the Construction Products Association, water is used throughout the construction lifecycle, from extracting raw materials to construction product manufacturing, throughout the building phase, and obviously once buildings have been completed and are occupied.

And when a building has reached the end of its useful life and is set to be demolished, water is used in that process too, not least to reduce the spread of dust and other debris into the air.

The CPA goes on to say that manufacturers of construction products rely on water across a broad spectrum of uses. Water, it says, “can serve as a lubricant, a cleaning agent, a sealant, a heat transfer medium, a solvent, an air pollution control medium, plus an array of other uses depending on the material and products being produced.”

Crucially, water is used in the manufacture of mortar and cement concrete, materials that have their own issues when it comes to energy efficiency and their environmental impact.

According to the journal Nature Sustainability, in 2012 concrete production was responsible for 9% of global industrial water withdrawals and 1.7% of total global water withdrawal.

The UK Centre for Moisture in Buildings reckons that up to 8,000 liters (2,113 gallons) of water may be included in mixtures and materials as construction of an average-sized new-build home proceeds, although this varies depending on the design.

The importance of water management during construction activity

Water is clearly a crucial component of construction activity. Consequently, its sourcing, storage, use and eventual disposal need to be managed effectively.

With mounting pressure on existing water supplies amid threats of droughts and other climate change-related events, having a construction water management plan in place is a must.

There is plenty of information available to the construction sector covering how to use – and conserve – water during project delivery.

In the UK, the Construction Leadership Council has drawn up water management guidance that asserts the need “to improve the efficiency of water use on construction sites through better planning and management … and to encourage consideration of environmental risks associated with construction activities.”

The CLC said its ultimate aim was to eliminate the demand and use of potable water in construction. “It is unlikely that water demand can be eliminated, but efforts can be made to reduce and use alternative sources, as well as reuse water for construction activities,” it added.

Once a project’s water needs have been identified, alternative sources should be planned for, with a metered potable supply available as backup.

The CLC calls for a water use hierarchy to be put in place, addressing – in descending order – the elimination of unnecessary water use; consideration of alternatives to potable water, such as rain and “grey” water; reduced use; and the reuse and recycling of water.

Effective water management is a group effort

The Water Conservancy organization encourages water conservation at every stage of a construction project, from design to planning and the construction process itself.

It also highlights the importance of involving the people tasked with delivering a scheme in the water use goals.

It is important, it says, to establish water conservation as a key objective of the project and ensure that everyone involved is aware of their responsibilities.

The Water Conservancy adds that induction training should be provided for new employees and contractors “so that they are also aware of their responsibilities and the benefits of the program,” while the project’s water management plan needs to be kept on-site to “ensure that all employees are aware of and have access to it.”

Water management needed to be discussed at regular meetings, the Water Conservancy says, with ongoing achievements monitored.

And in a nod toward the benefits of highlighting good practice, it adds: “Promote your successes with press releases to local media and industry associations.”

What are the rules and regulations around water consumption?

There are several areas of regulation covering water and the built environment, although these are focused on the degree to which water is used – and saved – once a development has been completed.

The mayor of London’s office spells out how agencies in London and adjoining regional and local planning authorities will work to “protect and conserve water supplies and resources in order to secure London’s needs in a sustainable manner.”

It stipulates that development should minimize the use of mains water by incorporating water-saving measures and equipment and by designing residential development so that mains water consumption would meet a target of 105 liters (28 gallons) or less per head per day.

There will also be support for sustainable water supply infrastructure in new developments as part of water companies’ water resource management plans.

How to reduce water consumption in construction: Now and in the future

While construction is improving water usage, designers of the homes and other buildings society needs will be creating them with water efficiencies in mind.

Planning authorities want limits of 125 liters (33 gallons) of water per person per day on new housing developments as part of the Building Regulations Part G and can demand a lower limit of 110 liters (29 gallons) as part of a planning condition.

The water footprint of a new home or office can be reduced considerably by thoughtful design.

Showers can replace baths, or baths can be designed to be more water efficient. Dual flush toilets are becoming the norm, while rainwater collection, via a water butt system, can replace tap water for most outside uses. Meanwhile, appropriate landscaping can protect homes from flooding – another consequence of climate change – and prevent wasteful water run-off.

With the world on the brink of a full-blown climate crisis, water efficiency in construction must be addressed. The sector is no doubt fully aware that it makes good environmental – and business – sense to tackle the water issue sooner rather than later.

Can Construction Be Completely Emissions-Free? Norway Aims To Find Out

DarkSky International, an education, advocacy and conservation organization protecting the night sky, approves new luminary standards, lighting programs and policy language

At one time, nightfall plunged our ancestors into darkness and let them marvel at celestial objects in an inky sky. But in recent times, our ability to alter natural light levels has advanced to the point that stars, planets and galaxies are fading from view. Of the 2,500 stars that should be visible, the typical American suburbanite can see only a few hundred.

Instead of starlight, the night is filled with streetlights, spotlights, stadium lights, neon signs, billboards and parking lot towers—all contributing to light pollution, defined by National Geographic as the excessive or inappropriate use of outdoor light. Light pollution damages human health, alters wildlife behavior and wastes energy and money as light blazes when and where it’s not needed. The result is glare that blinds drivers, light trespass that disturbs sleep, eerie orange skyglow over metro areas and confusing and garish groupings reminiscent of Times Square.

Until light is policed in the same way as air, water and land pollution, it falls to architects, engineers and designers to select lighting systems that perform their function while still preserving the night sky—with the help of manufacturers whose fixtures meet the specs for responsible lighting and governments that support policies to protect darkness.

“I think people are understanding the urgency of lighting design, because it’s become more and more difficult to see a clear night sky from anywhere,” said James Brigagliano, lighting program manager at DarkSky International.

The harmful effects of too much light

Light where it doesn’t belong disrupts the night and day rhythm encoded in the DNA of all animals and plants. That impacts behaviors from feeding and sleep to reproducing and evading predators.

Human circadian rhythms are attuned to outdoor light during the day and darkness at night. Breaking that cycle with artificial light increases the risk for obesity, depression, sleep disorders, diabetes and other diseases, according to research reported in Environmental Health Perspectives.

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For wildlife, prey use darkness as cover and predators use light to hunt, so illumination dramatically alters the environment and the odds. For instance, newborn sea turtles need to turn toward the ocean and safety after hatching on the beach, but often they’re confounded by light on shore. Birds that migrate or hunt at night are lured by brightly lit cities and veer from their flight patterns. And after dark, the insects that birds depend on are drawn to burning bulbs and their deadly heat.

Worse still, lights are often pointless, adding economic waste to ecosystem harm. DarkSky International estimates that at least 30% of all outdoor lighting in the United States serves no purpose and is emitted by lights that don’t have shields to prevent spillage. Wasting light costs $33 billion each year and uses about 120 terawatt-hours of energy—enough to meet New York City’s electricity needs for two years. Quality outdoor lighting could cut energy use by 60% to 70%, saving billions of dollars and reducing carbon emissions. But that depends on lighting responsibly.

Five principles for responsible outdoor lighting

DarkSky and the Illuminating Engineering Society jointly published the Five Principles for Responsible Outdoor Lighting to prevent and reduce light pollution. Designing new projects or retrofits using the principles can create beautiful, functional, healthy lighting that minimizes harmful effects and saves energy and money.

  1. Useful: If it’s not serving a function, you shouldn’t have it.

Identify the purpose of lighting and its impact on everything in the vicinity, including wildlife and habitats.

  • Targeted: Aim light so it falls only where it’s needed.

Direct and shield light beams so they point down and don’t spill outside the area being lit.

  • Low level: Light should be no brighter than necessary.

Use only the light required and make sure nearby surfaces don’t reflect light and create excess.

  • Controlled: Use light only when it’s needed.

Install motion detectors, dimmers and timers to allow only the minimum light needed available at any time.

  • Warm-colored: Use warmer-color lights where possible.

Cut back on shorter wavelength light (blue-violet) to the least amount needed.

New standards, programs and policies to bring back the night

The DarkSky Approved program provides objective, third-party certification for lighting design,  products and installed projects that reduce light pollution. Designers can search products by manufacturer, use, retailer, light temperature and residential use. Project standards fulfill requirements for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification as well, but requirements continually evolve based on new information.

“We’re cutting down on what we allow for high-angle lighting—from 90 to 80 degrees,” Brigagliano said. “So now we’re allowing only 1% of the total light output of a fixture to be between 80 and 180 degrees. There’s no benefit to light between 80 to 90 degrees and the new cutoff will help reduce uplight and sky glow.”

DarkSky Approved programs now include pedestrian lighting as well as sea turtles, sports venues and lodging. The new program addresses glare from light fixtures used in areas like campuses where people need lower-level lighting for safety at night.

“We also have wildlife-tuned luminaries, with subcategories like sea turtles,” Brigagliano said. “That’s needed because different species have different sensitivities to wavelengths. However, if we control brightness and shield the light source, we’ve taken care of much of the issue and the color of light is less important.”

In addition, DarkSky recently released an updated and simplified model policy that was written to make it easy for states and municipalities to adopt. “Just a little bit of improvement is better than none,” Brigagliano noted.

Every place a dark sky place

The International Dark Sky Places program certifies areas worldwide that preserve and protect darkness through responsible lighting policies and public education. Not all are remote parks and sanctuaries—a neighborhood or city can earn recognition as a Dark Sky Community or Urban Night Sky Place if residents are committed to a healthful and beautiful night.

“Anywhere where there’s a DarkSky-approved place, there’s been a fair amount of dark sky conceptual lighting design,” Brigagliano said. That work may soon be required as part of state or local regulations. At least 19 states and a number of municipalities have laws in place to reduce light pollution.

To be ready, architects, engineers and designers must recognize that light can be a pollutant—and balance providing light with protecting the dark.

Hero image courtesy Mark Eichenberger

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The unique retreat offers an extraordinary experience in a custom-built volcano-inspired structure. Go inside.

Friendship can take you to surprising places. For Cassandra Dalla Riva and Karen Lee, two best friends who post online about their experiences with do-it-yourself, off-grid construction on their shared Instagram profile, a chance meeting on vacation ended in the two creating a truly unique building, nestled away in the lush Hawaiian jungle.

Called “Inn a Volcano,” the fully off-grid luxury property looks just like two miniature volcanos, fully stocked with everything you need to enjoy one of the most unique Airbnb experiences on the Big Island. Built spoke to Dalla Riva and Lee about the story behind the building of the fascinating structure.

Two adventurers unite

Dalla Riva and Lee met on vacation. “We met five years ago on a vacation in Oahu one night and instantly clicked,” Dalla Riva said. “We have been friends since then.”

The two immediately bonded over their shared lust for life. “Dalla Riva and I have all these crazy adventures, like going to pole camp in turkey and CalEarth to learn how to build a hurricane shelter,” Lee said.

Dalla Riva agreed. “We’re all over the place, bringing our wildest ideas to each other and meeting them with support. So when we saw the OMG!Fund contest, I knew I had to reach out to Lee to collaborate to brainstorm ideas together.”

Dalla Riva had moved to Hawaii’s Big Island in 2019, building a tiny house on land that’s currently home to the volcano. Idly exploring the internet one afternoon, she saw a structure that sparked her interest. “We were looking through the OMG category on Airbnb and I saw a dirt-looking dome that somewhat resembled a volcano, so that’s where the idea originated,” she said.

In 2022, Airbnb hosted a contest to give 10 lucky winners $100,000 to bring their most awe-inspiring ideas to life. “We had entered a bunch of ideas together and separately, but I think because the volcano was harmonious with Hawaii’s landscape, the volcano village and the volcano national park, it made it an easy choice for Airbnb to choose this idea,” Lee said.

As Dalla Riva explained in an Instagram caption, “I told my boss I had won $100,000 and he was like ‘Sure you did. It’s probably a scam.’ But once that first $33,000 direct deposit hit, we got to work!”

Learning on the job

Dalla Riva and Lee didn’t have any kind of construction experience—but they had a vision. To successfully execute their plans, the duo went to Hesperia, California, to attend a workshop at the CalEarth Institute, whose mission is instructing students in sustainable and accessible forms of what they call Earth Architecture.

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“When we got back, we also reached out to Mark Hansen, who had built a permitted dome in Hawaii over 10 years ago, via letter,” Dalla Riva said. “He graciously gave us his cindercrete recipe and lessons on how to build in the rainforest,” Lee continued. “There wasn’t anything traditional about him, but his tradition of spreading sandalwood and knowledge of earth bagging gave us huge inspiration in creating the volcano.”

From that point on, it was up to them to leverage their new knowledge as effectively as they could. “I’ve never built anything in my life before the volcano,” Lee explained. “We learned on the job and had to redo things two, three or even four times over,” Dalla Riva said.

“Once the direct deposit hit, we hired an excavator operator to clear the land,” she said. “We had to bring in nearly 300 tons of rock before we hired masons to pour the foundation. Then, we did the first two layers of earthbags ourselves, with the help of friends, before we realized how much more help we would need.”

“Surprisingly, the earth bagging only took us eight weeks compared to the six months of finishing work,” Lee said. There were plenty of setbacks along the way. “We got scammed, we ran out of money and we didn’t finish in time,” Lee said. “At almost every step, it seemed like we made a mistake and had to do things over and over again,” Dalla Riva added. “Doing things for the first time is always the hardest.”

All’s well that ends well

After all their hard work, the duo was able to create a truly memorable structure—one that has captured and improved upon their original vision.

Dalla Riva said her favorite aspects of the finished volcano include “the lava lamps, the bathtub, the moss mirror, the candle niches, the comforter—I could go on.” Lee agreed, adding that the lava floor, rainbow crystals, bean bag, wood accents and the skylights are her favorite things about the dome.

Lee said that for her, the most memorable part of the structure was all the work and hours she and Dalla Riva put in to create it. “I loved all the literal blood, sweat and tears it took within us when earth bagging,” she said. “It felt religious and holy. It was spiritual so that this replicated the history of architecture.”

The volcano is in the top 10% of homes on Airbnb, Lee said, and has been getting lots of love on the internet as well. “We have had a couple Instagram reels go viral,” Dalla Riva said, while Lee added that the public response to the structure has been “mostly good.”

So, what’s next for the duo? “We are going to build another volcano!” they both enthused. “On the next build, I have a specific floor paper in mind in front of the heart-shaped bathtub,” Lee said. “What floor paper?” asked Dalla Riva.

And with that they were off dreaming of another unique and creative structure that will set the internet talking and create one-of-a-kind memories for visitors from all around the world.

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