The Barefoot Architect

Take a greener approach to building with this informative, easy-to-follow handbook--more than 200,000 copies sold internationally!

Whether you're a DIY builder or simply want to understand construction to better communicate with your contractor, Johan van Lengen can help. As a former United Nations worker and prominent architect, Johan has seen, firsthand, the need for a green approach to housing. This comprehensive book clearly explains every aspect of this endeavor, including design, materials, and implementation.

Discover the many options and important decisions you can make--such as siting and climate considerations--that are inexpensive, sustainable, and could save you thousands of dollars while helping the environment. Included are sections about urban planning, small-scale energy production, cleaning and storing drinking water, dealing with septic waste, and more. Plus, all the information is applied to three distinct regions: humid areas, temperate areas, and desert climates. Hundreds of instructional drawings allow even novice builders to get started with ease.

Inside you'll find:

• Bio-architecture, basic design, and site planning for humid and dry climates


• Material tips about adobe, rammed earth, bamboo, plaster, wood, concrete, and ferro-cement


• Information on foundations, roofs, floors, walls, doors, windows, and eco-techniques


• Introductions to solar heating, water-powered electricity, water purification, composting toilets, and more

The Barefoot Architect is a perfect book for these times of increased worldwide concern for the environment and for those who desire to build eco-conscious dwellings by utilizing natural resources.

Johan van Lengen was born in the Netherlands, studied architecture in Canada, and received his architectural degree in 1960 from the University of Oregon. In the early '70s, largely influenced by the Whole Earth Catalog, he abandoned a successful career as an architect in San Francisco to work on providing better housing for the disadvantaged in Latin America. He moved to Brazil, where he and his wife, Rose, founded TIBA (Bio-Architecture and Intuitive Technology), an institute for alternative building technology in the Mata Atlantica, the eastern coastal jungle of Brazil. At the same time, the van Lengen family started converting abandoned grasslands into tropical forest.

Johan has also worked for the United Nations and a number of government agencies in Latin America. At TIBA, he continues to develop new ideas in construction technology and ways to transfer this knowledge to the self-help builders in his workshops.