Desert Serenity: An Off-Grid Adobe Home in West Texas

By Joyanna Laughlin
Published on June 15, 2010
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This bed—carbed out of one piece of wood—came from the Ivory Coast.
This bed—carbed out of one piece of wood—came from the Ivory Coast.
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While this dome was first built to store tools, friends suggested that Simone use it as a meditation space or music room and some also called it a capilla (chapel). Now it serves as a guest room and holds two beds, a desk and a chair.
While this dome was first built to store tools, friends suggested that Simone use it as a meditation space or music room and some also called it a capilla (chapel). Now it serves as a guest room and holds two beds, a desk and a chair.
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As morning light dances in through the filmy muslin curtains, Simone delights in waking up in her adobe bed and looking out through the French doors to the Mexican Sierra mountains. The ceiling is fourteen feet high and ten feet wide. The bed is made of adobe bricks topped with a one-inch wooden platform and a magnet mattress. Simple furnishings allow the strength of the architecture to take center stage througout the house.
As morning light dances in through the filmy muslin curtains, Simone delights in waking up in her adobe bed and looking out through the French doors to the Mexican Sierra mountains. The ceiling is fourteen feet high and ten feet wide. The bed is made of adobe bricks topped with a one-inch wooden platform and a magnet mattress. Simple furnishings allow the strength of the architecture to take center stage througout the house.
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This interior wall uses the smaller roof adobes, and the closet door was made on site. The ladder leads to a sleeping loft, and its rungs serve as rods to display mud cloths from Mali.
This interior wall uses the smaller roof adobes, and the closet door was made on site. The ladder leads to a sleeping loft, and its rungs serve as rods to display mud cloths from Mali.
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The two vaults frame the west patio with its fountain, date tree and bougainvillea. The sculpture, Spirit Gate, is by Arden Scott of New York. The carport is covered by a palm-frond roof.
The two vaults frame the west patio with its fountain, date tree and bougainvillea. The sculpture, Spirit Gate, is by Arden Scott of New York. The carport is covered by a palm-frond roof.
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In the gallery, twenty-inch-thick adobe walls plastered with earth and water glow softly as light streams in from the French doors on three sides and from the clerestory windows on the east wall. Peeled vigas (beams) support the roof—topped by an observation deck—while multiple coats of turpentine and linseed oil bringa soft matte finish to the smooth adobe floors. Arden Scott's Spirit Boat sculpture hangs from the ceiling. On either side of the gallery are patios used as roofless rooms.
In the gallery, twenty-inch-thick adobe walls plastered with earth and water glow softly as light streams in from the French doors on three sides and from the clerestory windows on the east wall. Peeled vigas (beams) support the roof—topped by an observation deck—while multiple coats of turpentine and linseed oil bringa soft matte finish to the smooth adobe floors. Arden Scott's Spirit Boat sculpture hangs from the ceiling. On either side of the gallery are patios used as roofless rooms.
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The east-facing porthole in the bedroom is placed at the head of a built-in adobe bed to allow the sleeper to witness sunrises.
The east-facing porthole in the bedroom is placed at the head of a built-in adobe bed to allow the sleeper to witness sunrises.
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Handmade wooden cabinets hold pots and pans in Simone's spacious, light kitchen. From the window over the sink she looks out at the wildlife and, beyond that, south toward Mexico. Since the house serves as a model to show local people what is possible, cabinets and countertops were made on site, and appliances were purchased in Presidio. The dining table and chairs came from IKEA in Houston, Texas.
Handmade wooden cabinets hold pots and pans in Simone's spacious, light kitchen. From the window over the sink she looks out at the wildlife and, beyond that, south toward Mexico. Since the house serves as a model to show local people what is possible, cabinets and countertops were made on site, and appliances were purchased in Presidio. The dining table and chairs came from IKEA in Houston, Texas.
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This covered porch or terrace, called a ramada, features a thatched roof that the work crew built from ocotillo cactus harvested from Simone's 500-acre property. The ramada provides shade for the home's south facade, and much time is spent here. Otherwise the house offers four dining spaces—three outdoors and one indoors.
This covered porch or terrace, called a ramada, features a thatched roof that the work crew built from ocotillo cactus harvested from Simone's 500-acre property. The ramada provides shade for the home's south facade, and much time is spent here. Otherwise the house offers four dining spaces—three outdoors and one indoors.
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In the domed guest room, the roof is supported at each corner by an arched squinch. Recycled railroad ties form the lintels.
In the domed guest room, the roof is supported at each corner by an arched squinch. Recycled railroad ties form the lintels.
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Simone Swan
Simone Swan

In 1972 during a Paris dinner party, a friend told Simone Swan to read Architecture for the Poor by Egyptian architect Hassan Fathy. The book changed her life. Deeply moved by Fathy’s philosophy, Simone went to Egypt, where she apprenticed with Fathy, then went on to build adobe houses in the west Texas desert using knowledge she gained half a world away.  She also founded a nonprofit–the Adobe Alliance–to carry out experiments in adobe building methods, including developing plasters that breathe. The Alliance schedules at least one workshop a year on how to build healthy, beautiful, and affordable homes.

In the 1960s and early 1970s Simone founded and ran Withers Swan, a unique public relations agency in New York that specialized in art and the environment and whose clients included museums and universities. Later she served as executive vice president of the Menil Foundation, a philanthropic organization. In1972 when she read Fathy’s book in French (the French title translates as Building with the People) and was transformed by the architect’s vision of a sustainable society in which people in need of housing gained health, pride, and inspiration by cooperatively building their own beautiful homes from native materials such as earth. Simone studied architecture with Fathy, visited his projects, assisted him with translations, and helped develop an institute to educate people about Fathy’s vision for low-income housing. By the time he died in 1989, Simone was determined to carry on his ideas.

Common ground

What do the pyramids and sand dunes of Egypt have in common with west Texas? More than you might think, according to Simone. Both are fertile river valleys located in deserts, and even the climate and birds are similar. Egyptian culture centers around the Nile Valley, and Presidio, Texas–where Simone designs and builds adobe houses–is located at the confluence of the Rio Conchos and Rio Grande rivers (creating a fertile agricultural region) in the northeast corner of the Chihuahuan desert, about fifty miles west of Big Bend National Park. Like far away Egypt, agriculture was once a mainstay of Presidio’s economy. However, landowners sold their water rights to El Paso, so Presidio now, like Egypt, experiences high unemployment and significant poverty. Both regions have traditions of building homes out of the earth.

While visiting Big Bend National Park in 1991, Simone decided on a whim to assist with the restoration of a seventeenth-century hacienda that was named Fort Leaton when it became a fortified trading post in 1850. Simone thought that in Presidio she could carry on Fathy’s work. To this end, she founded the nonprofit Adobe Alliance in the mid 1990s. Her goal is to build low-cost, energy-efficient housing that is climactically and environmentally compatible with desert environments. The people who attend Adobe Alliance workshops are inherently interested in, and attracted by, earth architecture.

A sheltering oasis

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