Apologies again for the lateness of my post on the cobb oven! Whilst this has been a ‘feature’ of our little bit of cabin-site for some months now, I haven’t posted about it.
Despite being incomplete, the cobb oven is very sturdy. To give you an idea how strong it is, Matthew can stand on it!
The next stage is to give the cobb oven a lime render to help to protect it from the elements. As you can see, however, it is fairly cracked already. The strength of the clay/straw mixture is impressive; we are considering building our internal walls with this mixture. By limewashing them, they would be a lovely white, but more interesting than standard plaster walls.
Rebecca – it’s a delight to follow your progress from here in Oregon, USA. Let me know when your oven is functioning and I’ll send my instructions for the famous no-knead bread. Very easy to make and has those chewy crusts and interior with character.
In another post, you talked about having lower ceilings to save heat. That’s true, but in our hot southern states, the tall ceilings were used to cool the room (before AC), with the hottest air up in the top of the room. The houses were designed to have good flow through air front to back.
Peace, John