Moving in with Oscar the Grouch

Posted Thursday, June 07, 2007, 5:05 PM by Lonely Planet

If your space ship had to crash land somewhere on Planet Earth, Taos, New Mexico would be the perfect low-profile spot. The locals would just figure it was a new Earthship.



In the high desert scrub just outside town, adobe-coloured mounds bulge from the ground, wavy walls sparkle with a brilliant mosaic of embedded glass and then there's the fanciful turrets. A community of groovy off-the-grid houses called Earthships, the structures look like ornately camouflaged objects that might blast off any minute.



Tidy stacks of old car tires and empty beer cans aren't the aftermath of a booze-fuelled car promotion, but the raw materials for these 'biotecture' buildings. Constructed from unorthodox recycled materials, each house is completely self-sufficient, harvesting solar and wind power, collecting rainwater in huge cisterns and reutilizing grey water for landscaping or vegetable plots. A mixture of packed sand, tires and aluminium cans form the exterior shells, and embedded glass bottles filter sunlight into mesmerizing indoor rainbows. Flanked by distant snow-peaked mountains, guests can overnight in comfortable yet sustainable sumptuousness. The passively heated solariums riot with plants and playful multihued interiors rival those of an upscale boutique hotel.

So consider your refuse bin and imagine the future of housing.

Beth Kohn is getting down and dirty in the Southwest States researching the USA guidebook. Flying saucers. Earthships... Wonder what the hell she'll do next? Stay tuned.

Labels: The Americas

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