This excerpt was reproduced with permission from The Art of Natural Building. Other excerpts from The Art of Natural Building include: Eighteen Design Principles and Working with Lime. To purchase this book, please visit the Oikos Bookstore.

Siting a Natural Building

— Michael G. Smith

Selecting a building site is one of he most critical design decisions you will ever make. The wrong choice can have long-lasting negative effects that are difficult (or impossible) to mitigate. Many of the characteristics that most strongly determine what it will be like to live in a place are not immediately obvious during a quick visit. To find the best building site, you need to spend a lot of time on the land through different seasons and in extreme weather conditions. If possible, spend a full year camping on the site, or visit it frequently before pinning down the precise building location. Also speak to neighbors and look through county records. The care you take will pay off.

The following suggestions are intended specifically for siting dwellings on rural land, but most are applicable to other situations and building types (in the Southern Hemisphere, reverse north and south notations).

Physical Site Characteristics

Slope

Don't assume you need a level building site. Often it's best to build on a slope and leave the flattest places for gardening. Slopes can provide the best views and offer advantages in water and air drainage, since gravity will help move water and wastes. Excavating a flat pad on a sloped site can provide earth for building, gardening, or landscaping. On the other hand, very steep slopes may complicate access, require excessive digging, and be difficult to get around on during building.

Aspect

The direction a sloped site faces makes a big difference in ground temperature. South-facing slopes, with their surface more nearly perpendicular to the rays of the winter sun, collect more heat in the winter, which could translate into substantial energy savings.

Drainage

If possible, pick a naturally well-drained site. It will save you work, expense, materials, and repairs. Avoid marshy areas, flood plains, and depressions. Stay away from seasonal creeks and gullies where surface water may flow only during part of the year (or maybe only once every several years). If you can't be on site during the heaviest rainfall of the year, imagine a storm of Biblical proportions and figure out where the water would flow. If you're stuck with a poorly drained clay soil and a rainy climate, put the building on a slope so that you can create artificial drainage.

Subsurface Geology

One of the first things I do when exploring a potential building site is to dig a lot of holes. I want to know how far down it is to bedrock (which will inform my excavation plans and foundation design), how much topsoil there is, and what kinds of amendments the soil needs for building with. If the site has deep, rich topsoil, then it might be better used for a garden or orchard. I also look for evidence of landslides and try to determine whether the site is seismically stable.

Microclimate

Solar Access

In any climate, you can save a lot of money and energy in heating and/or cooling your home by using simple passive solar design strategies. Where winter heating is needed, windows on the south side (or an attached greenhouse) make a big difference but only if you have winter sun on the building! The best sites for passive solar heating (and for photovoltaic electricity) have an unobstructed view to the horizon from the southeast to the southwest. If trees to the south shade your site, consider respectfully harvesting or substantially pruning them. The number of trees you will save by decreased heating needs over the lifetime of the building can easily make up for the ones you take now.

Shade

In hot summer climates, afternoon shading can make the difference between a cool, comfortable retreat and an oven. Look for tall trees to the southwest and west of the site. Deciduous trees are especially useful since they block the summer sun but drop their leaves and let the winter sun through. In general, trees and vegetation around a site will keep it cooler and moister. Deciduous trees and vines can also be planted after the structure is complete.

Prevailing Wind Direction

Because of local topography, wind direction on a specific site can very enormously from the regional norm. Find out from which direction the biggest storms approach your site. (If you live in the woods, look for big fallen trees. Which direction did they fall?) Will there be wind-driven rain, sleet, or snow? Are you in a valley that channels cold winds past your site, increasing your future heating costs? Are you on a ridge with a spectacular view of the ocean but no protection from whipping gales?

Air Drainage

On clear winter nights, air cools off and condenses wherever it is exposed to the sky, flowing downhill like a viscous fluid. Wherever its passage is blocked by a rise in the ground, a line of trees, or even a building, it comes to rest, creating 'frost pockets' of much colder air. These are the places that freeze first — not a good location for your tomatoes or a cozy home. Valley floors are often the worst. If your site is on a slope, then make sure that cold air can drain away downhill. Also position your buildings where early morning winter sun will warm them up sooner.

Fire

Wildfire runs uphill and in the direction of the wind. Ridges and hilltops are the most susceptible to burning. Waterways, roads, and irrigated gardens all make effective firebreaks.

Floods

If you're near a river or stream, find out where the 100-year flood plain is and site any buildings beyond its reach. Get to know old-timers in your area and ask them about the most extreme weather conditions they can remember.

Site Planning

Master Plan

It's incredibly useful to have a good understanding of overall land usage before you site any building. Look as far into the future as possible. What buildings, gardens, orchards, pastures, ponds, woodlots, and wild areas might you eventually want on the land, and where does it make the most sense to put them? How can you position them relative to each other in a sensible way so that each part of the system meets the needs of the others and of the whole system? For example, can you dig a pond to provide earth for your cob house, fire control, and a home for the ducks and geese, which will also help with erosion and drought control, be part of your graywater system, and irrigate your fruit orchard? This sort of design takes thought and careful planning.

Access

Although it's not always necessary to have a permanent road to a building site, it's important to think about these questions: How will you transport materials to the site during construction? How will the inhabitants get themselves, their babies, groceries, and the like to the building in rainy or snowy weather? What about emergencies — getting sick people out or fire engines in? It's very romantic to build on a remote site with no vehicle access. But a few experiences of hauling heavy materials like sand, cement, and foundation stones uphill via wheelbarrow makes me recommend that you seriously consider at least a temporary road, which can be decommissioned or shortened after construction is complete. If you do create a new permanent road, then plan it very carefully.

Water and Utilities

Drinking water, wash water, electricity, phone lines — if you need them, where will they come from? Avoid having to pump sewage uphill to a septic system or leach field. Plan for your graywater to be useful downhill from the building site in an orchard, garden, woodlot, or pond. Wastewater considerations suggest that it may be best to avoid locating your home at the lowest point of the property.

Building Materials

If you plan to use materials from the land (such as earth, sand, stones, trees, straw , or water) in construction, where are they located and how will you transport them? It's much easier to roll stones downhill than up.

Social and Political Considerations

Zoning and Regulations

Different counties have different land use policies and varying abilities to enforce them. Within a county, areas are zoned for different purposes, such as residential, forestry, or light industry. If your plans include agriculture, manufacturing, multiple residences, or building with alternative materials and you pick the wrong location, then you may find yourself fighting your neighbors and the county government. Neighbor relations are of primary importance, so nurture them. Try to find an area where other people are doing the sorts of things you would like to do. Zoning and regulatory considerations should affect your choice of a building site on a much larger scale — at neighborhood, county, and state levels.

Privacy

Think about not only visual privacy but also protection from noise, smells, and light pollution. A nearby highway may be loud on one side of the property and impossible to hear just around the side of the hill. Some kinds of noise and smells (hunting, field burning, etc.) are seasonal. If you want to keep a low profile, then figure out where your building site is visible from. Can it be seen from a neighbor's property, a driveway, or a major highway? Remember that visibility can be much greater in winter when some trees drop their leaves.

Community

Would you like your home to be clustered near friends and neighbors for mutual support, safety, and companionship?

Easements

Owning the title to a piece of land doesn't mean that you own all the rights to it. A neighbor might already have permission to put a road through your property. The phone or utility company may own a corridor where they plan to put a cable or pipeline. A mining company may own the mineral rights to your land, allowing them to drill or tunnel beneath the surface. These rights are called 'easements,' and should be recorded on the property title.

Future Development

Find out who owns surrounding land and what they plan to do with it. Clearcut the forest? Build a housing development? Get to know your neighbors and ask them what rumors they've heard. Also check with your county planning department to find out about their plans to widen roads or change the zoning.

Other Important Considerations

Views

Although you can establish beautiful short views by landscaping your site, you can't do much about the long views. Either you have them or you don't. Views of the sky and the distant horizon do a lot to combat feelings of claustrophobia and cabin fever, especially for people who live in the forest or in places with cold or gray winters, or for those who spend a lot of time at home. Sometimes you can open up long views by judiciously pruning or clearing trees around your site.

History

It's always useful to know what human beings before you have done on the land. Who were the original human inhabitants of this place? Are there sites of archeological or religious significance that it would be better not to disturb? In recent times, have people used chemicals that might still be present in the soil and water? If there's a history of manufacturing, agriculture, or even previous building, it might be a good idea to get the soil tested for toxins.

Ecological Impact

It hardly seems necessary to suggest that you think seriously before cutting down a lot of trees or draining a wetland for your building site. But all outdoors places are habitat. Get to know the plants and animals that you will displace or kill during construction. Find out where deer trails pass through, where owls roost to hunt, and who is living underground. Try to locate your building where it will cause the least disruption to natural cycles. Many people advocate building on the most damaged sites: clearcuts, logging depots, or abandoned pastures. That way, through erosion control, revegetation, and so on, you can actually improve the ecological health of the site.

Feng Shui

The Chinese art of building placement is based on the interrelationships of factors like geometry and subterranean waterways, but you don't have to be a trained specialist to use your intuition. Different places have different kinds of energy. Spend time on a proposed building site, meditating or just living, and see how it feels. Is the energy happy or sad, welcoming or resistant? Would you be comfortable with it in your home? Usually the most magical spots, like that special natural meadow in the back woods, are exactly the places where you should not locate a building. Any intervention changes the feeling of a place, and building a house has an extreme impact. If the place is already as good as it can be leave it alone.

— Michael G. Smith provides consultation to owner-builders on the placement and design of natural buildings.