"Tiny House" idea.

My daughter is 12 and after watching th  "My Little Home Stead"  YouTube videos with her mom and I,  she wants her own tiny house more than ever.

I live building,  but earthshaking seem like a lot of work,  an I'm the main one who will be doing the work.
That,  the urbanite filled soil on site and the cost of bags has me looking for alternatives.

My idea starts wood posts set in a circle on stone bases and lashed with wire to steel posts, driven 1.5 plus feet into the ground.
Nail pallet wood to the posts and wrap in tarp,  then start berming  against the outside.

As the berm rises,  the amount of soil needed to will become excessive.
At that point,  I would drive another ring of posts into the ground, but this time with living willow.
I would fill in the willow ring with soil, woody debris and compost.
Burlap sacks and horizontal willow branches will help hold the soil in.
The roof would consist of one or two super sturdy beams going from post to post across the circle, and other rafters tied into that,  followed by pallet wood,  tarp and soil.

Still would be lots of work,  but the soil would be protection for the tarps only, so it doesn't need to be very thick or of an particular composition.
Plus,  I have most of the material required on hand.

An alternative to the willow wall would be an outer ring of metal stakes.
I would start the outer circle of  metal stakes instead of  berming.
These stakes would hold up a two foot course of chicken wire,that is then filled with soil.
When the first course of chicken wire fence almost full,  I would overlap another one and start filling that.
I could finish the outside with stucco,  and make sure the roof had a large overhang.
This would be more work, but  the results would be more conventional, and perhaps more durable.

I like the

What size are you looking at?
What zone are you planning to build in? Rural or Urban?

This is an urban lot.
Size is just 10' in diameter, just big enough to hang a hammock from the roof, small enough to be considered a shed.

Basically round ish wofati interior with an exterior wall to hold the berm to a manageable width.

Are you planning to ram/pack the earth?

You could make the outer ring from cattle panel or woven wire fence.

You need to protect those walls from rain, BIG soffits.

William Bronson wrote:My daughter is 12 and after watching th  "My Little Home Stead"  YouTube videos with her mom and I,  she wants her own tiny house more than ever.

an I'm the main one who will be doing the work.

She wants the house for herself, but you're doing all the work?

Speaking as a person whose father is constantly trying to do my projects for me no matter how much I want to do them myself, please consider backing off! If she wants it that much, then it sounds like a perfect opportunity for her to learn building techniques so she can put it together herself. 12 is not too young.

Help her learn, yes. Make sure she's working safely, yes. But let her enjoy the process for herself.

Great replies.
R Scott,  yeah,  exactly an alternative  WOFATI.

Ellenandra, you make a good point.
I want her to be invested in building this, and I want her to be successful at it.
She isn't likely to to that with a earthshaking building, because of the large amount of labor involved, but taking over her project won't work either.

I need to talk to her and see what she wants to do.
I will still coach and facilitate for her,  but you are right,  it should  be her thing.
Thank you very much for your insight!

I'm not expert in wofati houses, but for something that small I don't think a normal wofati approach will work. Does she want it entirely underground, or would 1/2 underground work for her? entirely underground, access might be an issue unless you can somehow cut a staircase, or move enough earth to do what seems to be the normal wofati approach. Wofati are built because the ground works for them usually, and it'll be no small effort to turn the ground into something that works for it. I don't know how much easier it'd be, if any, but something like the 'superadobe' approach would work for half underground or less. effort seems to be slightly less as well. https://www.calearth.org/intro-superadobe. looking at the pictures they have, I'm picturing the straight wall section being the underground portion, with the cone entirely above ground. depending on how deep you dig, you might only need to do ~three or four feet high of coils.

But while I second letting her do the work, I would also point out that she's 12 and some things are physically not in her capabilities yet and she could mess up a growth plate trying. I'd let her take the lead in design and planning (contigent on it being safe and within clear limits) and just making yourself available to bounce ideas off and for heavy lifting. before you get matierials of any sort, go out and mark off the 10 feet in diameter. see how much space the hammock takes up.

This website says rammed earth can be done below grade as well, so might be an alternative to bags. http://www.greenhomebuilding.com/QandA/rammedearth/uses.htm
oh even better, this is a page of links to various natural building styles. http://www.greenhomebuilding.com/natural_building.htm (even one to permies.com, we've come full circle ;) )

The Ohio online library might have some of the natural building books, so that might be a good place to start too.

WB

Some free advice, I'm afraid. From one who stumbled onto a few good moves, but who cudda done way better.

Relationship and just plain fun may be as important as anything. More important. That doesn't mean just being sloppy and aimless, mind you. Might be worth doing a little jujitsu on your mind or just plain collar your  builder's mindset  and wrestle it off into the spectator seats.  Then see what thoughts or interest might waft from her young otherly world - without you saying much of anything about anything, especially not about how to build anything. IOW, don't say or do anything w/out her asking or telling you to and then facilitate her plan. Just be safe and  at those times be totally clear about why, but don't bother about how except let her dictate methods based on her own whims as long as the safety angle gets covered.  Step in and and step back out quick as you can, trying not to crush any young imaginings w/your big expertise.

If not much of anything gets done, that's probably just fine, provided she and you, in that order, had a kinda enjoyable "walk in the park" while working out how to not worry about the other's silly foolishness and lack of real understanding... If her mother's around, she might help a lot as foil, referee, etc.

If you find that your teaching gene just squeezes past your best intentions, maybe direct it more at teaching her how to be a good customer or creator rather than how to build. (Actually, being a good customer/client _is_ building something, really). That is a class just about everybody seems to have missed out on! Let her know you're helpless and really _need_ her directions. In a way that you can understand.  (You're fairly stupid in some ways, right? <G>).

The hardest thing is to take yourself out of the picture except as a welcome, and sometimes just tolerated, resource and fan. You want a really big challenge? There it is. _That_ is hard. Think of it as leveling the playing field between different people from different worlds with totally different strengths and thoughts and with vested karma all over the place. The playing field is her project, in whatever weird form it takes with her pushing or pulling and you forming. So that, ideally, each can "play hard" and have a good exciting game of it w/out stepping on or getting squashed by, the other.  I'm pretty sure you would much rather it not become _your_ project. Right?

Hmm. Kinda hi-fallutin. Oh well.

May your project(s) together turn out to be interesting, fun, and maybe even challenging for all involved!
Rufus