building the kids a little hobbit house, question about the roof...

I'm going to build a round house that backs on to a small hill (the hill is lower than the roof) I'm going to frame in the roof so that it slopes down to the hill. I plan to sheet it with plywood, then would like to cover it in mud and seed it so it blends in to the yard/hill. It's a fairly steep angle and I'm wondering how to waterproof it and build so that the mud doesn't run off?

Carrie; You are correct, mud will run off at least untill it gets seed started. Sod would work ,but costs $ You mite have good luck with collecting moss from the forest and mixing it with soil and seed , this should hold the dirt & the water untill your seeding takes over. Or a series of horizontal strips across the roof could help hold your soil on. as far as waterproofing i would think that residential (Tyvek)should work ,plastic would not breath and could rot your plywood after a few years .What ever you go with, if you get it to take , should look realy cool! Please post pictures when its finished. Tom

Carrie Moir : I expect that you are not planning on any plumbing or cooking going on in your kids playhouse/ hobbit house, if you isolate it from water failing
from the sky it should stay dry just like a root cellar, and have about he same temperature, I think that it may be a very pleasant place to be during the
'dog days of summer', but will be just a little to cool for them most of the time, then again with nice hobbit cloaks quilted on the inside ?!! i could be wrong !

Anyway, I would look at the Wofati Forum Designs at least as far as putting a membrane on the roof, and channelling the water away from the kids area !

Also you could stack cute saplings up around the outside and over the soil as they do in making Huglebeds to help hold the soil inlace !


Lets see so far we have a Hobbit house, cool summer hide-away, w/out leaving home! a root cellar, protected outside storage,and some of the benefits of
the Hugeculture beds which could be part of the lower walls, trapping and recycling the runoff off of the Hobbit House.

Happy kids, costumeswhorth making because they will need them ! and lots of photo opportunities, please continue with this and show us lots of pictures ! Big AL !

Remember that Tolkien was not an architect

.....and read up on Wofatis.

As far as waterproofing the roof and keeping the plywood from rotting.

Have you considered tarring the top of the plywood?  Yah, it's a messy job but I think you can still buy cans of pure tar without any man-made chemical additives that's just pure tar as it comes out of the earth.

Even better idea, use "pine tar" rather then the "natural bitumen tar" I originally suggested.

About twice the price but it is considered the natural way to waterproof and rot proof handmade wooden boats without causing any toxic problems for marine life or the person building/using the boat.

That along with some horizontal slats tacked on top of the plywood to keep the earth in place until the seeds grow into a root system should give you a natural roof that will be water tight and won't rot through your plywood.