The Global C.O.B
The Global C.O.B. Team (Community of Biobuilders) consists of trained cob builders of all nationalities, ages, specialties and in all areas of the world, ready to teach a workshop or lead a project…all in support of more earthen construction replacing concrete on the Planet and increasing awareness and experience of natural building everywhere, especially in the non-Western countries where the awareness and need is greater for well-built earthen housing.
Please refer to our For Students pages to learn how you can proceed on the journey to becoming a Cob Workshop assistant, teacher, intern and builder with CruzinCobGlobal.
Here is our international team of teachers….we look forward to having you join us soon!
CLAUDINE “COB QUEEN” DÉSIRÉE
MASTER COBBER/COB INSTRUCTOR
Born and raised on the 22nd floor of a skyscraper in NYC to two Jewish Euopean immigrants fom France and Romania via Morocco, I carried my Manhattan/European roots with me to California and beyond. I studied Geography, International Relations/Development and International Environmental Policy in the academic world in California, France, and Switzerland before and while raising Viva, Joia and Xica, my three stellar sons, currently
established all over the U.S. and honing their journeys and all cob lovers of course!!!! My eldest Son Viva has become a Master Cobber (see below) in his own right, specializing in Fire & Cob, meaning beautifully-sculpted heaters and kitchens, as well as stand-alone Cob Art.
My academic pursuits soon gave way to the obligatory West Coast Yoga/Meditation/Massage path and thus the work of a Spiritually Awakened life was initiated. My academic interests were also complemented with hands-on learning in every aspect of Sustainable Living skills, which I then put into action on my 5000 square foot homestead in downtown Santa Cruz near the beach with cob buildings, permaculture, a compost 
toilet, chickens, fruit trees and the lowest utility bill in SC! When my youngest son turned 18 in 2014, and I turned 50, my next Dream was manifested with the sale of my Mini-Urban Ecovillage in Santa Cruz to fuel a solo Global Ecovillage and Cob Teaching Bike Tour for the next five years through 15 countries in Africa, South America, the US and Europe, in which I taught over 30 workshops, most of them 4-5-week full builds.
In January of 2019 I bought 5 hectares in the Alentejo region of Portugal, planning on manifesting a Cob Ecovillage there. However the isolation and
dependence on a vehicle, as well as the extreme winter/summer climates and drought conditions led me back to the Azores Islands that had caught my Heart the first time I stepped out of the plane and smelled/felt the air. I had been brought to the Azores by an astrocartography reading in which my Venus and Neptune lines were strongly activated there. My Neptune line runs right through São Miguel and pretty much right through the Quinta da Vida Beleza Ecovillage Farm
Sunrise
that I created from scratch between January 2020 and 2023, with the help of my workshop students, teachers, volunteers, friends and my sons. It is the present culmination of my 20+ years of Cob Life! It is a fearlessly manifested Vision. It is my comfort as I wake up every morning on the 2nd floor of my Cob Home and look out at the Atlantic Ocean to see if it looks good for an early morning swim. The Azorean moist pleasant breezes that are always a perfect temperature wrap me in LOVE, nurturing my Soul and Spirit every day. The village I envisioned became a reality in a mere 3 years, and is now highly enjoyed by campers, bungalow guests, volunteers, family, friends, students, cats, chickens and many other living beings visible and invisible. It is the first if its kind in the Azores and a unique phenomenon on the Planet. You can find it on GoogleMaps and visit the website, and come visit us for a dose of Natural…
Our last additions are my beloved and magnificent 2-story personal Compost Toilet with ocean view and an Outdoor Rocket Stove Kitchen. My unending love of travel, speaking in other languages and cultural immersion will always continue and I envision having beautiful cob houses to come to in all of my favorite places, which I am continuing to discover. I am so grateful for the strong support of the Universe confirming this path every day.
Learning to build cob houses has been an unexpected gift in so many ways. The joy I see on people’s faces at my workshops when they roll up their pants for the first time and stick their toes in the cool soft mud, the laughter and heart-to-heart conversations ignited while mixing and building with a partner, the meditative concentration of working on a sculpture, the satisfaction of stepping back and seeing your beautiful trimmed wall section, the excitement at embedding bottles and sculpting an art window, the bliss of relaxing with good food and a cold beer after a full day’s building in community, and the gratitude of leaving confident in starting a dream project….are why I do this work. Over and over again, all over the world, cob building creates childlike joy, love, community, and empowerment. It has shown itself to be much more than a building technique. It is a remedy for a better Life on Earth. It creates Happy People living in Happy Houses. May the legacy of CruzinCobGlobal continue to heal the World one workshop at a time, one new cobber and one more cob house at a time. Aho.
VIVA HANSEN
COB INSTRUCTOR/MASTER COBBER
As a kid Cob was this weird, empowering thing my mom did to build us a bigger home. I participated when I wanted, and skipped out when I didn’t. Though as time went on the Cob effect was undeniable. Every time a build was underway there was music and laughter and food and wisdom from people of all ages and backgrounds.
As I matured through my high school years I was able to involve myself with enough earthen building to feel its practical magic. Then one 
summer I created an opportunity to build a meditation room with my high school physics teacher. His passionate involvement with our Indigenous community transformed the project into a spiritual experience. Throughout the summer we made long trips to sacred rivers and hand-picked beautiful stones for the foundation, often walking for miles on a trail with three or four stones in a backpack. Then as I finished my college experience and returned to California, the opportunity to join my mother on her journey bloomed.
For me, Cob is primarily a physical experience. It has always been about sweat and breath. The feel of different dirts and sands, straws and rocks. And it is a mystical experience, bringing me back to the earth. But what I have learned from the last year is that Cob building can be a tool to sew communities back together. To bring “strangers” into a common space and make them family. In that vein, Cob really is a product of my life philosophy. Something that I can stand behind fully because I know that from top to bottom it is peace, hard work, sustainable and love.
As I continue to learn in this life I will continue to share what Cob has shared with me.
TOM VAN WELL
COB INSTRUCTOR/COB BUILDER
Hi there! I’m Tom — born and raised in the only not-flat part of the Netherlands, the deep south. Around the age of 20 I began spending most of my time outside the country, and before long I was living abroad full-time. Since 2020, Portugal has become my home base.
Living on permaculture farms here brought me into contact with Natural Building, and it was love at first sight. I devoured every bit of information I could find. The Hand-Sculpted House completely captivated me, and before I knew it, my feet were on a blue tarp and I was mixing my first batch of cob in a CruzinCobGlobal workshop in the Azores and then Tennessee in 2023.
Following my curiosity has taken me on a journey I never could have predicted: COB builds, timber framing, conventional construction, and deep dives into plastering. Through private builds, apprenticeships, and workshops across Portugal, the Azores, Tennessee, Puerto Rico, Switzerland, and now Japan, I’ve been lucky to learn and work alongside passionate natural builders and true masters of their craft.
Teaching in Puerto Rico, 2025
Roof Mania in Puerto Rico!
That’s why I’m genuinely excited to be leading two CruzinCobGlobal workshops in Portugal in 2026, the Outdoor Kitchen and the Full Build. I love Portugal—its food, the people, the mountains, and the sea. Getting to know and building with Portuguese clay soil and local materials while creating timeless structures in different zones, has been my main passion.
Sítio do Valverde, my friend Nuno’s place, is the perfect workshop site: peaceful during the week so we can focus on the build, and ideally located for weekend adventures to Lisbon, the ocean, rivers and mountains. Nuno will be an amazing Host and his place is stunning and comfortable. I speak Portuguese fluently, so anyone who is less comfortable with English, can count on me for translations at any moment.
Looking forward to another unforgettable life-changing CCG workshop!!!
See you in the mud — vaaaamos!
PAULA CARNEIRO (Moçabarro, Brazil)
COB INSTRUCTOR/COB BUILDER
always smiling!
I was born in Campo Grande, raised in Curitiba and Salvador, and now I live in the countryside in the mountains of Mantiqueira, Minas Gerais, Brasil, where I’m eco building my own house. I’m also a professional dancer, graduated from Bahia Federal University in 2012, and have worked with performing and visual arts, cinema and cultural centre management. Meeting Claudine and cob building in 2018 simply transformed my life. I started a natural building business after my first advanced cob workshop with CruzinCobGlobal in Guatapé, Colombia. I continued learning with a full build workshop in Colorado, later that year. In the beginning of 2019, I joined with Naiana Maximo and Priscila Bogéa to create the first female eco-building collective in Brazil called Moçabarro (Clay Gals is a translation we love!). We began teaching cob workshops and expanded to other natural building techniques and finishings. In our very first year of work we had the opportunity to build a full 100m2 house (@terra.333) using a variety of earthen building processes in this very successful project. Since then we have been working collectively on eco-refurbishing, rocket stoves, cob ovens, cob furnishings, tadelakt, plastering and other finishings. We have also taught short-length workshops at my building site as well as for other hosts in Brasil. Cob building is now a way I find to express gestures and print them on earth. Here is the link to our successful all-women cob business: www.mocabarro.com.br
@mocabarro on Instagram and Facebook.
NATÀLIA CALVET
COB ASSISTANT/COB BUILDER
Always a smile on a happy Cobber’s face!
My name is Natàlia, and I grew up in a rural village in Catalonia, surrounded by nature and simplicity. From a very young age, I felt a strong connection to art in all its forms, to plants and rivers, and to the invisible movement that flows between people and their environment. Curiosity has always guided me, leading me to explore different cultures, ways of life, and new perspectives.
My path into natural building began unexpectedly, when I started constructing a small cob house with my father, without any prior knowledge or experience. That project became a turning point: it awakened a deep passion for natural building, grounding me and connecting me to the earth in a transformative way. Since then, I have been committed to learning, growing, and
Sculpting in Kenya, 2025
sharing this practice that combines creativity, sustainability, and a profound respect for the natural world.
In February of 2025 I participated in a CruzinCobGlobal Advanced Cobber Certification workshop in Kenya, followed by an oven workshop. I was very happy to get a formal instruction and learn the proper techniques for all the elements in a complete build. I made many new friends including local Kenyans, and got to see a new country and learn about its culture as well. Since then I haven’t stopped. I organized my own bench workshop at a festival, and continued with more learning, including a second CCG Full Build workshop in Belgium as a return student in the summer of 2025. My next project is bringing cob to children in the schools so I can inoculate them at a young age with this amazing practice and skill of natural building. Since I studied early childhood education, this would be a wonderful way of bringing two passions together to create a new life path.
This will be my first Assistant position and I am excited to prepare over the next 4 months, so I can offer the best of myself and my knowledge thus far as Cob Assistant to Claudine.
JAN PRITCHARD
COB ASSISTANT
I’m Jan, half English, half German. Growing up, I was lucky enough to go to a Steiner Waldorf school, where creativity, crafting, and movement were valued and taught alongside academic topics, giving me a balanced grounding for life (and cobbing).
I took a gap year after school, cycling 5000km around New Zealand, then another 7 gap years followed. I travelled around most European countries by motorcycle, worked as a kayaking guide in France, Sardinia, and Greece, spent 2 years teaching surfing and outdoor skills to kids in Hong Kong, worked as a gardener, volunteered in all kinds of places and packrafted 2000km across Patagonia. As one may be able to tell by now, I love being physical, outdoors in nature.
Jan’s first Cob Sculpture, in Naguábo, PR workshop 2025
At some point I found myself dreaming of building a house for myself, where I could settle down and stop all the globe trotting. I bought a book on Natural building and decided that cob was the most interesting method. So I read a few more books, cover to cover, fascinated by every page. For example, every word in the book: ‘the hand sculpted house’, to me, is pure logic. It makes sense, and just feels right. Needing to get my hands dirty I joined the next available course I could find, which was a complete CCG cob build in Puerto Rico. 5 weeks spent together with others with a shared purpose felt great. The house was beautiful, and the community around it warm. Inspired, I recently built a cob oven in Sicily, it was interesting to see the different qualities of different soil, sand and straw.
Being still very much at the start of my cob journey I hope to share the knowledge that I have with others in workshops, enabling them to be confident enough to go out alone and build for themselves, while also continuing to learn more myself. Being connected to the natural environment is what I truly care about, and what better way to go about this than to spend time together in the mud learning valuable and practical skills.
