PR Family Home Rebuilt After Maria

We have completely lost the home we had been constructing for the last year due to hurricane Maria. This is our only residence and it was a project which we wholeheartedly worked for making it completely sustainable and ecofriendly. Our land is located at a tiny island off the east coast of Puerto Rico called Vieques, which served as a US naval training range until 2003. When the navy left, it turned-in some of the lands to the municipality of Vieques. These lands were vacant for almost a decade before people finally decided squatting into them. As a result, a non-profit organization, Verde Vieques, was incorporated to distribute 900sq.mts lots of land to Vieques residents that have housing needs.  Most of the housing in our community were constructed with wood, including ours, and thus were destroyed by hurricane Maria. We believe in not only giving our community and children faith to persevere and achieve, but also in establishing a new, ecofriendly way to live for the benefit of our community and future generations.

We knew from the beginning of our project that we wanted to build a home that was sustainable and ecofriendly. We first explored the possibilities with adobe construction but because of lack of faith in ourselves and difficulties finding appropiate materials, we decided to go forward with wood, which was cool, accessible and easier to build with. Now after the hurricane, we have interpreted mother nature's message to live in tune with her. We would like to renew our project in a more natural, respectful way by using Hyperadobe, which is a new technic that merges ancient knowledge with contemporary elements yielding weather proof, fire proof, and earthquake proof houses. These houses are elliptical shape domes that look more like igloos and that is the key to their success.

How does it work? Adobe has been used for millenniums in many places in the world. The city of Marrakech is a perfect example of how long adobe has been used in this planet. The difference between adobe (technic used in Morocco) and Hyperadobe is that instead of being walls made from adobe bricks, Hyperadobe is made with raschel mesh tubing (what large onion sacs are made from) filled up with a mix of 90% clay and 10% concrete. Adding concrete to the mix stabilizes the mix and it does not allows water to wash down the clay. This gives a durable steady structure that is a lot more suitable for tropical weather since clay retains a lot less heat than concrete. For more info on Hyperadobe, you can follow this link: http://earthbagbuilding.com/articles/hyperadobe.htm

Thanks to our Vieques neighbor Pamela Scott, who has given us raschel mesh from her own Hyperadobe project, we feel confident that this is the start of a successful and pioneer construction project for us and our community. We welcome donations either thru gofundme as well as in Pay Pal ([email redacted]). These contributions will be used for Hyperadobe construction assessment and workshops, machinery to flatten land for construction and gathering clay, building concrete foundation, raschel mesh tubbing, tools, and labor efforts.

Any contributions or social media shares given to our campaign are very much appreciated.

Sincerely,

Moncho, Diana, Carei & Joaquin.

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