Straw Bale, Solar Home in the City
(Page 2 of 4)
June/July 2005
By Catherine Wanek
Building a Dream with Bales
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When Mark and Kristin met in 1983, they both dreamed of having a solar homestead in the country. But when the time came to build, they were quite happy in the city. They decided to look for a lot in Capitola, a quiet beach community near Santa Cruz, where they could walk to restaurants and bicycle to the grocery store. “It’s energy-efficient to live close by the amenities you need,” Kristin says. “We wanted to build in the city to show that you can bring sustainability there.”
After searching for nearly two years, the Sullivans finally found their prize — a run-down bungalow on a narrow lot just blocks from the beach. The existing cottage was taken down, and the materials were set aside to be used for the new house.
Initially, the Sullivans were hesitant about straw bales — they had been told that bales are too bulky for urban building. They also had other common concerns about straw bale building — fire, bugs, mold and earthquakes. But after investigating their questions, they said, “Why not?”
“With all my initial skepticism about straw bale, I never thought I would become a proponent of it,” Mark says. “But straw bales covered with earthen plaster make a wonderful natural interior space.”
They interviewed five architects with straw bale experience and eventually chose Kelly Lerner of One World Design. For the general contractor, the Sullivans chose Boa Constructor Building and Design, consisting of Michele Landegger and Debrae Lopes. The Sullivans also employed longtime friend Frank Schiavo to design their solar system.
Lerner asked the Sullivans to fill out a questionnaire before she began the design and floor plan. Then Lerner, Landegger and Lopes worked with the Sullivans to refine the two-bedroom, two-bath, two-story floor plan and the craftsman exterior.
Even though straw bales were not in Capitola’s building codes, the local officials were immediately receptive to the proposal, Mark says. The Sullivans had a structural engineer evaluate the home’s design; they also gave the city officials the state of California’s model for straw-bale building codes. After that, the Sullivans were approved and on their way to building Capitola’s first straw bale home.
By siting the house along the north side of the 45-by-100-foot lot, all the living space is oriented to the south, for maximum daylight and solar heat in the winter. To keep the scale of the home modest, they designed the line of the gabled roof to cascade back from a front porch, to a slightly higher first-floor roof, then to the taller second-floor roof.
