A LITTLE GRASS SHACK IN IDAHO
The history and construction of a grass hut.
March/April 1984
By Bill London
An experiment in low-cost, low-impact housing produced a comfortable year-round dwelling . . .
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by Bill London
At first glance, most folks probably felt that the little grass but nestled amid the snowy pines and firs of northern Idaho was a bit out of place. However, "strange" or not, it stood proudly as a testimony to two men's dream that an adequate (though by no means permanent) dwelling could still be constructed with hand tools and locally available materials.
Designed and built by Tom Reynard and Christopher LaPaglia as an experiment in low-cost, low-environmental-impact housing, the grass shack stands 22 feet in diameter and has no space-stealing center support. The poles, branches, and bundles of pasture grass used to construct the but were harvested from area forests and meadows. The baling twine, windows, lumber, and woodstove were obtained at no cost, too, from that other popular source of free mate rials . . . the county dump.
The men began the project by building a pole frame that was lashed—and occasionally nailed — together. The rafters, like the spokes of a wheel, meet at the midpoint of the roof, and are connected there to a block of wood that serves as the hub.
With the skeleton in place, Tom Reynard went on to use a scythe to cut wild pasture grasses (in that part of Idaho, they grow to a height of four to six feet). Loose bundles of these weeds were tied together to form a "thatch" about one foot in diameter . .. and then were carried to the building site. Once the bundles were assembled, groups of six to eight of them were bent double over a straight branch that had been cut to span the distance between two vertical poles. The ends of thatch were then tied together. Next, these large "shingles" were lashed onto the frame, beginning at the bottom of the walls.
On the roof and south-facing side of the building, each succeeding row of shingles at least partly overlapped that below it to create a wall about six inches thick. (The north-facing walls were 18 inches thick to protect against icy winter winds.) The men then covered the roof with plastic and canvas for waterproofing.
