v doline kamennih idolov
v doline kamennih idolov
v doline kamennih idolov
another look at tourism
This project is located in Ergaki, in the Sayani mountains in the middle of Siberia.
The objective of this project is to change the behavior of tourists. It has a mainly educational role where they learn to save resources, use local materials, select and prepare wood for the fire, plant trees and shrubs, make compost, cook local cuisine etc. But also they understand how we can live and use the building without harming the environment.
The building has a concept of a lodge or a youth hostel. It can accommodate up to 20 guests, and 2 people - guides - who take care of it
and live there.
It is built on a slope, as it is very difficult to find a completely flat surface in this area. But in fact, thanks to the position, the building is buried in the slope from the north and is open to the south. It is almost "hidden" in the landscape as the idea is that it is nature who reigns here, but not architecture, and especially not man. This semi-buried position makes it possible to achieve significant savings on insulating materials and to conserve heat. The premises of the building have a dome structure, since the dome retains heat better (igloo principle). A dome frame made of metal rods (base only) and tied branches (as lighter material) is filled with a mixture of earth, clay, dry straw, of dry branches, with a small addition of small stones. So that the mixture becomes very solid and dries quickly, slaked lime is added to it, this is very important!
We know that the walls of the Novgorod Kremlin in the 13th century were built with this mixture, and where the lime is not completely extinguished, the mixture is very strong like a stone, even now, 7 centuries later. Thanks to the straw, the walls of such a mixture retain heat very well, and thanks to the straw, this mixture is not heavy (it weighs about 100 kg / m3). Earth with clay is not flammable, even dry straw in the composition of the mixture can not ignite, because with a suitable mixture it is completely saturated with this mixture. Thus, the building was constructed from the same soil that was dug for construction, from materials collected on the site, except for the necessary glass, lime, several metal rods and pipes.
All the main activities take place around the kitchen and the dining room, where the oven is the center. Here this oven is used not only for heating, but above all for cooking. It separates the kitchen from the dining room. The kitchen is arranged so that the main action -cooking- takes place around the oven and that all visitors participate in the preparation of the meal and learn to do it with the help of a guide.
As the stay has an educational target, visitors will be able to discover how this building was built, why we can say that it is alive, that it breathes thanks to the oven. In fact, this oven is an analogue of a typical Russian oven in which there are air channels. These channels receive fresh air from outside the building, the air heats up inside the oven and enters the room. Then, the air is sucked under the floor (a simple wooden board of about 24mm) in the oven, passes into the fire place and go out through an exhaust duct. Thus, air circulate constantly in the room. In winter, it heats up, passing close to fire places inside the oven. And since the oven is not heated in summer, air enters the room cool and fresh. Now this heating and ventilation system by oven is sometimes used in the Urals in Russia.
In the residential part of the building, the oven combines two bedrooms, which is more suitable for saving materials, as well as for better heating of the rooms thanks to an adjacent wall. Each room can accommodate up to 5 people, as tourists usually travel in small groups, but not in couple and not alone. Here, a heating oven includes three fireplaces. One for each bedroom and one for the bathroom. In summer, only the one in the bathroom is used to heat the water. To do this, a water tank is integrated into the oven, it is located next to the fireplace. The bathroom air is drawn into the fire place from below the toilet floor, so the bathroom and toilet air is naturally ventilated.
With the help of the guides who live on site, visitors will not only learn to take care of the place, prepare dishes using the oven (in the old way, without wasting wood), choose the trees that can be cut and use it for heating (prepare the wood for the following groups of tourists), and then replant, make compost, take care of the vegetable garden using purified gray water, etc. But also they will learn how to make furniture and various useful objects from cattails, reeds, branches and needles and other materials of natural origin found around, and also to make a tissue from simple and white nettles, assembled on site. Between the kitchen and the bedrooms there are two rooms to store necessary tools. These spaces also serve as a technical part of the building. The dining room gives way to activities outside the meal. Here during the day visitors can create useful objects, furniture and tissue.
And of course, they must give back to nature the resources they take from it, for example sowing what is harvested.
Having understood how we can live without damaging nature and without ruthlessly devastating its resources, perhaps tourists will apply
this knowledges in their life.
Ergaki, Sayani mountains.
This video is created from videos found on the web in free access, adding selected music
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