Construction
The National Trust worked with a conventional building company (lambert-gill from Carlisle) for the majority of the construction. Although lacking any experience of this type of construction they were receptive to the project and its unusual requirements. Their day to day staff and site supervision ensured a good working environment and considerate construction.The contract was undertaken as a negotiated tender under a partnership arrangement which helped to spread the risk.
Where possible within the schedule, opportunities for training, skills development and hands on involvement were created, through undertaking aspects of the building as practical courses, most of which were led by Amazon Nails, from Todmorden, W. Yorkshire, who are the UK's leading straw bale building trainers and consultants. Amazon Nails were also the main consultant on the development and the design. Alongside the general construction and the courses, a number of National Trust staff and hundreds of volunteers helped out in all manner of ways.
Documenting the work going on and the people involved was an integral part of the Footprint Project, and there are excellent images which show its progress. The Courses gallery shows the training events that saw the car tyre foundations built, the straw walls put up, the roof started, and the walls plastered with lime on the outside and clay on the inside. The Volunteers gallery shows images from the volunteer activities and work parties which moved on a lot of the work.
The General gallery shows some of the other key events during construction, a range of general building site pictures and some of the detail of the building; the Timeline gallery is just that, changes on the site between March 2006 and April 2007. A time-lapse camera was used throughout construction and a 5 minute movie is viewable on the Timelapse page.
The Local schools art project show photos from a project which ran alongside the construction, including a fantastic sonic postcard made of recordings and music of the events.
Finally, the Resources section has a couple of information sheets giving more background and detail.
