Well well well it’s been a long road and a long silence since I have expressed myself to the Global Cob Family, including our students who have learned with us, all those that still want to learn with us, and those that are Cob lovers, supporters and fans of our work: spreading the essential and important knowledge of building with simple, healthy, local materials. Additionally our workshops become safe spaces for being and knowing and showing ourselves more authentically, when we live intimately for 5 weeks with like-hearted others, sharing, healing and loving. Just know that both aspects that we provide a space for are equally important in our mission. The first is our outward mission, in which we create a structured daily building & learning schedule, supported by great meals, a beautiful location, lovely Hosts, and a community of new friends. The second happens by itself, as a result of people dropping their masks upon arrival, grounding with the Earth, touching clay during most of the workshop, working at and past their comfort edge, allowing themselves to feel and share daily, and in weekly communal circles, and being open to “not knowing” while grateful for the group and all they receive.
While the workshops can only insure a training in COB Building, with a high success rate of completing the builds in the allotted time, the inner transformational journey people experience is unique to themselves and their own needs. After 20 years of holding workshops, we have found that the longer 5-week builds, which attract people serious to learn professional-level skills while working very intensively, are the incubators for deep internal experiences of all kinds. While the Instructors are not trained to facilitate and support emotional processes, as the focus of the workshop is building a Cob building, they do create a space for connecting and listening in the Morning and Afternoon Circles, and longer weekly Council Circles for unconditional listening and sharing. Apart from those built-in opportunities, we let the group and the clay do its natural healing magic, and it always does.
My 5-year GlobalCobTrotter Bike Tour (2015-2020) took me to Europe, Africa, South America and the US, many times over, circling the Atlantic Ocean. In the 9 years since the first Full Build workshop in Tarifa, Spain, our students have been from all the continents, and sometimes came from as far away as Taiwan, Japan, Korea, New Zealand, Mauritius, and Kenya, to join these international Cob Pods that have planted Cob Bungalows and Ovens in over 50 locations in 30 countries, at the last count. Of course the ecological travel costs for those that traveled far is not aligned with our mission of teaching with local materials, but I believe the impact of each student going back to their region and teaching many others and having a local influence and beyond, compensates and leads to seeds of change that I alone certainly cannot plant. And the GlobalCobTrotter Tour was on bicycle whenever possible and reasonable and took ME to the students, which makes more ecological sense..
Last year, in 2023, was the beginning of my intentional stepping back from teaching ALL the annual workshops with changing assistants, after 20 years of an organically-grown unique career in natural building education. I have been writing in “Natural Building Education” on my tax returns for a while now, and noone has inquired about it from the powers-that-be. I guess it is an official profession now, for me and many others on the Planet. I am proud of all the Advanced Cobber graduates the CruzinCobGlobal’s 5-week Full Build workshops have produced since 2015, including my son Viva, who have gone on to create their own ventures and businesses teaching and building on all continents. (Well not Antarctica…yet. Maybe there is clay deep under the ice, but I pray we won’t know.) The most passionate, motivated, hard-working, consistent and persistent graduates, who have also demonstrated self-initiative in creating work and businesses for themselves, while sometimes also networking with other students, are the ones who have the qualities we look for in those interested in joining the CruzinCobGlobal Teaching path from Assistant to Co-Instructor to Instructor. While this journey has taken 20 years to get to where we regularly show up at the top of the first page in Google searches for Cob Workshops, it has also been laden with much trial and error, many hard-working minimally-paid workshops, many small workshops and cancelled workshops along the way. Each workshop has been followed by thoughtful and continuous work to improve and refine all the steps needed to choreograph the many moving parts it takes to offer an experience that delights and satisfies all the participants: Students, Instructors & Host(s). We have come a loooooong way, Baby!
I am proud of my budding team of CCG Assistants & Instructors hailing from the U.S., South America, Africa and Europe. Soon I hope to include continental Africa, Asia & Australia on the list. Unbeknownst to me when I took my first Cob workshop in 2000 and went home to my small plot in downtown Santa Cruz to ponder where I would build my first personal space, a studio for myself in the backyard of the “Streetcar House” my 3 sons and I called home, I was also planting the seed of my future profession. Aligned with my 2 Geography degrees and an MA in International Environmental Policy, the business I grew over the last 20 years would serve the Planet with much-needed knowledge, skills & empowerment. True to my studies, I played a part in the multi-faceted effort to mainstream Cob Building in the Building Codes and help open the minds of conventional Building Officials & Culture to the advantages, & benefits of Earth-based Construction. I permitted the first Cob Building in Santa Cruz, CA by retrofitting an illegal cob building I slept in for 10 years. In the Azores I have also exposed many people to cob building from local builders who helped me with finishing various cottages, to touring guests, to engineers, architects and builders from the Circular Building Conference in June 2024, who also toured the buildings and land.
At this time I am sitting in my oceanview 2-story Cob Villa (a permitted warehouse) in the Azores, which is my only home base today, and feeling so grateful for all that has transpired to make this Quinta Cob Ecovillage Farm happen. Between my own spiritually-supported and guided efforts and willingness to do the footwork, and the work of volunteers, students, and professionals, as well as the green lights of the local government, it is now officially online as the quintadavidabeleza.org. This summer I received endless reservations for the 3 bungalows and campsites. Alot of demand. People want this. They want to experience Earth-connected living, even if only for a week, to heal and remember what is real, to sleep and sit in silence, to do nothing, to be surrounded by Nature, to pee outside, to learn to use a compost toilet properly, to use resources consciously and sparingly, to walk barefoot and sing, to eat wild weeds and herbs and fruit from the trees, to read a book, cook with fire, and return to the roots of being a Human. The Quinta da Vida Beleza means Farm of the Beautiful Life. I baptised it from Day 1 and painted the gate with dancing bodies. It is so fulfilling to know that that is how people experience life here, feeling free and peaceful. It is definitely a retreat that feels isolated and far, yet is a short walk to the ocean and town. I am very happy to provide this space for people to connect with themselves and their inner Truth of who they are, and to find the courage to course-correct their lives to be more in harmony with this Truth. It is so important for our Planet to harbor happy fulfilled Humans, doing what each one’s Soul was born to do, living with respect for the Earth, Nature, each other and….most importantly…one’s Self. This is our Work as Humans in our lifetime. To be silent enough to hear the Inner Voice and Call and courageous and strong enough to follow our Heart.
Blessings to All and may you feel happy, peaceful and free…Aho
