How to Make DIY Adobe Bricks

Reader Contribution by Tom Keeling and Fazenda Tomati
Published on February 12, 2020
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Tom Keeling

Recently, we built our bathroom addition using adobe bricks. The mixture for adobe bricks use is similar to that used to make cob walls. Unlike cob walls, however, which are constructed using a wet material, adobe bricks are molded wet, and then sun-dried to use when they’re hardened. For this reason, adobe bricks are much more commonplace in areas that experience hot, dry periods during the year. Mediterranean climates are one example of where adobe can work well (including California, Southern Australia, and elsewhere), as well as parts of Central America.

With bricks, you can build as high as you want in one day, whereas with wet cob, you’re limited by how quickly the wall starts to slump under its own wet weight. For this reason, hot, dry locations can take advantage of the drying effect of the sun, and I encourage those living and building in these climates to consider using dry adobe bricks to build structures.

Make Your Own Adobe Bricks for DIY Construction Projects

Build a Wooden Mold

First, you’ll need to make a mold using any material available to you, or that you know how to work with. We make ours using wooden boards, but metal or plastic would work just as well, and possibly be more durable too. You can make a mold to produce one, two, or even more bricks at a time. The limiting factor really is how many you can pick up at any one time in order to drop the bricks out of the bottom of the mold.

So first, cut your wood to size. When fixing the wood together, you must make sure that each box is as close to square as possible. If they’re off even a small amount, this will make it difficult for the bricks to slide out of the bottom of the mold when they’re ready. Add a couple of handles on the ends to make it easy to lift when full of clay.

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