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 immigrants, 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. honing their journeys and all cob lovers of course!!!! 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 from January 2020 until now, in 2023, with the help of my workshop students, teachers 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 has, in the last 3 years, become a reality, and now enjoyable by campers, guests, volunteers, family, friends, students, cats, chickens and many other living beings. This summer it came alive online when I posted it on GoogleMaps and ended up fully and happily overwhelmed with demand from visitors from so many countries. People loved it!
Our most recent additions are a 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 and one 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.
NICOLAS PIMENTEL
COB INSTRUCTOR & MASTER COBBER
Happy Builder!
I was born and raised in Santiago, Chile, and had a childhood deeply connected to the arts and nature. From an early age, I felt a strong curiosity to travel and learn about other cultures, people, and places. During my university years as an architecture student, I went to study in Porto, Portugal in my final year. There, I first encountered the idea of natural building while attending a conference in Prague. After this brief introduction to theoretical knowledge, I wanted to get hands-on experience. In 2017, while searching online, I found a CruzinCobGlobal workshop taught by Claudine in the Azores Islands, and that was the beginning of this amazing journey of fascination with and passion for Earthen Building, as well as a great, long friendship with Claudine. After spending a long time on the islands, I returned to Chile to receive my degree in architecture. I also went to Colorado to assist in a CCG workshop lead by Claudine, and then assisted & co-taught 2 CCG workshops in Chile.
Nico leading the light straw clay 2nd floor of Claudine’s Cob Villa in 2021
I also learned other natural building techniques at TIBÁ in Brazil, and continued working independently in Chile, where I built my first light straw clay house in southern Chile. This is when I eventually settled in the northern Patagonian mountain town of Pucón, where I co-founded my architecture studio, PIWA. My focus is designing homes in rural areas, integrating bioconstruction and bioarchitecture techniques. Parallel to this, I returned to the Azores Islands to teach a light clay straw workshop on Claudine’s land in 2021 and a Complete Full Build Workshop in 2023.
Plaster Master!
My motivation to keep learning has never waned, and this drive took me to Marrakech to learn Tadelakt from ancient masters. I also constantly return to books to learn more about various techniques and experiment with them. In 2024, I began teaching online workshops as well as in-person workshops on earthen plasters in southern Portugal and southern Chile.
Currently, I work as an architect in my own studio, mainly designing in southern Chile. I am also co-founder of a conservation project called Jungla Peumayen, located in the central region’s mountains, where we focus on the conservation of flora and fauna, conducting rewilding efforts by reinserting wild animals, among other activities. I also co-founded Kalina, a creative space in nature located in northern Patagonia, where I reside and am currently building my second light straw clay home.
I love teaching these techniques and learning from other students. I believe every interaction is an opportunity for learning, and bringing earthen building to new environments and professionalizing it is a crucial task in contributing to this paradigm shift. The earth has built me and I am constantly growing and learning from it!
ALICIA SALAS
COB ASSISTANT
Beaming Cobber!
Hola, me llamo Alicia! I’m a Californian Tica (Costa Rican), who has led an unconventional
life. I have a major in International Relations and a minor in Spanish. My studies and travels have led me to live in the villages of Slovakia, the brilliant beaches of Brazil, a cacao farm in Costa Rica, and now Puerto Rico where I live.
Plastering in Borikén/Puerto Rico
My first introduction to Natural Building was in Costa Rica in 2019, where I built and lived in a super adobe home. I then had the opportunity to learn and construct two adobe pizza ovens. Being inside my first Earthen home was life changing. I was amazed by the beauty, how I felt living in an Earthen home, and how it completely rewired my brain. I have always loved architecture, sustainability, and interior design, and this encompassed everything I love. Suddenly I didn’t just want to build my own house one day, I wanted to build an Earthen house. I started looking at different techniques, and that is when I discovered Cob.
The crew in the Azores led by Nico!
I built my first Cob house with CruzinCobGlobal in the Azores in Portugal in 2023, taught by Nico. After the house build I stayed on to build a beautiful cob oven and bench. I now live in Puerto Rico, working in construction on houses that were affected by hurricanes. In February 2024, CruzinCobGlobal came to Utuado Puerto Rico, and I came back as a return student for my second house build. This house was unique because we got to work with bamboo for the reciprocal roof. I am particularly fond of Earthen floors, plastering, and roofing! I love Cob, and I love the community and friends I have made along the way. Natural building has changed my life, and I am very excited to continue working in this field, with the dream of building my own Cob house one day!
KRYSTAL ALEXANDER
COB INSTRUCTOR/COB BUILDER
Born and raised in the Midwest of the United States, Krystal has always been drawn to a life of community and connectivity with the land. Working as a Licensed Massage Therapist and Sound Healer for years she was looking to take the next step onto the path of healing and community living. She first began her journey into the life of building with natural materials in the summer of 2017 and hasn’t looked back. Since the first workshop with CruzinCobGlobal she has 
helped build a cob sauna, cob studio and 4 cob pizza ovens! Fueled by the passion to help spread awareness of the energy involved in everything we consume and create and to become more connected to our roots to minimize the footprints we leave behind. She believes through this hands on work we can unlock our souls creativity to spread what is true to us all with the world around. Krystal is more than willing to share the gifts of healing modalities with all who are interested.
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
CHRISTIAN EDER
COB ASSISTANT/COB BUILDER
Introducing Christian
Since I saw my first Cob Building in California I fell immediately in love with these earthen buildings. A few years later I finally got the opportunity to attend a cob workshop in the summer of 2023 on the beautiful island of São Miguel in the Azores, taught by Nicolas Pimentel.
I immediately felt drawn to building naturally without making a huge impact on nature.
I am so fascinated with building, not only the construction side itself, but the community aspect as well. To create something with like-minded people felt right and was fulfilling and fun. Thus I also attended an oven workshop and went on to build a compost toilet as a return student at Quinta da Vida Beleza, Claudine’s Ecovillage Farm in the Azores.
Floor-focused in the Azores
I grew up in the German-speaking area of the Alps in Northern Italy, surrounded by mountains and beautiful forests, lakes etc. From a young age nature and sustainability were part of my values, and that is why this particular style of building makes a lot of sense to me.
I really appreciate the intuitive approach to cobbing and its bioavailability. After my return home from the workshops, I was happy to randomly find several colorful clay sources in my area while hiking.
The joy of the reciprocal roof
After high school and working for some time, I went traveling around the world following my passions like climbing and hiking. I took occasional employment and studied Eastern philosophy, in particular meditation and yoga in India.
I love languages and learned German and Italian at home, then English, Spanish, some French and am currently working on Portuguese. I love to get to know people, cultures and cuisine from around the world. In essence, I love the diversity of our planet and getting to know it first hand.
Tom Van Well
COB CO-INSTRUCTOR
I’m Tom from the Netherlands and living and working in Portugal now. After I was born in Amsterdam my parents decided to take me out of the big city, and we ended up in Maastricht! Other cultures and languages were never far away, in Belgium and Germany right next door.
Doing honor to the region I took my bachelor in ‘European Studies’, with no clue where I wanted it to take me. However, taking example from an entrepreneurial father I’d always known I wanted to do something for myself. Exploring different paths led me to be in South America for more than a year, finish my bachelor’s degree in Berlin, and staying there to work in a café, which I had been doing since the age of 14.
Leaving all my stuff in Berlin I decided to head to Portugal, and never returned. Life took me on a rollercoaster and since that felt good, I did not resist. While living on farms, my partner and I learned about distillation of wild plants for essential oils and hydrosols. Over the last 2 years we have ntake people on hands-on distilling experiences and travelled around the Lisbon selling our products at markets.
Happy Cob Sculptor!
Four years after leaving Berlin, I still find myself in Portugal, climbing its rocks, taking cold bathsevery morning in the Atlantic, playing guitar on its beaches, building my community of like-minded people, developing my own COB projects and continuing the business of artisanal distillation projects, all while enjoying life!
I have been living on Permaculture farms in different countries over the last few years, where the concept of natural building was always present in theory and in practice. The accessibility and intuitive approach that is inherent to COB enchanted me like nothing else. I started following this interest, reading everything I got my hands on and practicing whenever I could until I naturally flowed into really dedicating my being to the study and practice of this ancient technique.
Tom teaching his own workshops this year in Portugal
After some years of study, I found CruzinCobGlobal and registered for two workshops back to back: a Cob Oven course in the Azores and a 5-week Full Build in Tennessee. This turned out to be a catalyst for my skills and the beginning of the next new chapter of my Life: building independently, sharing knowledge through workshops and growing my COB community in Portugal.
The 5-week Full Build Workshop in Puerto Rico is a continuation of my teaching and learning journey. I feel blessed co-teaching this workshop with my friend Christian, whom I met in a CCG workshop! I am excited for you to join us, as these workshops are a life-changing experience, and have definitely been for me.
