Austin, Texas, USA
Category: Sustainable Houses
Year: 2023
Architects: Moontower
Design Team: Greg Esparza, Frank Farkash, and Jessie Temple
General Contractor: Moontower and Cross Cabin
Client: Private
Photographers: Casey Woods
Materials matter.
Can plant based construction materials help fight climate change? Yes!
They can also challenge our industries’ biases and assumptions at a time when solutions are urgently needed to combat carbon emissions.
As part of a multi-year research and design process, homeowner Greg Esparza, in collaboration with Moontower, commissioned and built a detached 2 bed/2 bathroom studio for his family. The mission was to explore what happens if we put the climate change impact of materials FIRST when designing a home.
The resulting structure built of cross-laminated-timber panels, and insulative cork siding is unconventional, naturally.
It looks different.
Smells different.
Sounds different.
Feels different.
Our carpenters even say the saw dust tastes different.
With cross cabin we have demonstrated what a home can be with NO concrete above grade, NO gypsum wallboard, NO cementitious siding, stucco, or mortar, and NO petroleum based insulation or paints.
It is our sincerest hope that this is a home for the future. Where residents can feel nature at home. And by building with more natural materials take part in transforming the day to day practice of home design and construction to achieve a zero carbon, equitable, resilient, and healthy built environment.
