Project by: Aidan Galloway; Marie Davis; James Oberting; Hannah Yujing Zhao; Liam Philipp Ewald; Sean Eren
After undertaking quantitative, qualitative, and other forms of research on our chosen case study building in Mora, New Mexico, this project investigated the construction process of an un-stabilized (raw) rammed earth wall portion at 1:1 scale. Our early studies in software like Tally demonstrated the high carbon footprint of including even a small amount of cement in our rammed earth mix. Therefore, we explored un-stabilized rammed earth and went on to even use a mix that had been previously rammed and deconstructed. (Concrete cannot be recycled like this.) The building had a sizeable rain collection apparatus that included a gutter system down a rammed earth buttress, the end-spout of which served as the full scale “moment” model we constructed. The question of raw rammed earth’s susceptibility to erosion led us to propose and test a tile-embedment strategy. No adhesives were used; construction was largely monolithic.
