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Peter Spencer - my LHI story
from Village Green magazine
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Peter Spencer - my LHI story
Location: Devon
Peter Spencer is Vice-Chairman of Shobrooke Parochial Church Council.
I started out wanting to get the job done of restoring the ancient cob wall around our churchyard. There were quite a lot of repairs needed, and about sixty yards of it had to be completely rebuilt from the ground up.
It was explained to me that the LHI doesn’t give grants for restoration unless it is part of a wider community project. Nicola Burley, the Historic Buildings Advisor for Devon County Council, was extremely helpful. She took me through the procedures and helped me with suggestions that would fulfil the LHI criteria - and would have the added benefit of making local people feel much more involved and interested.
We had a Demonstration Day on the site when people were invited to turn up at any time during the day wearing their filthiest old clothes and welly boots to join in trampling on the cob and stamping it down and making mud bricks and all sorts of interesting things.
Although the people in the village were familiar with cob buildings, most of them had never seen any cob actually being made. This project has brought it home to us that these ancient crafts can be carried on and are still being carried on - the children were very keen indeed, and I feel I’ve sown a bit of a seed of interest in the idea that may bear fruit in the future.
Cob building simplicity itself
"I discovered that there are lots of people who are very keen on keeping cob and other old country crafts going. In fact, it’s a very simple process. It involves mixing soil with straw and water, and that’s all there is to it. It has to be the right kind of soil, the right consistency, not too heavy - heavy clay is no good - and it mustn't be too fine, so sand is no good. The skill comes in knowing exactly the right proportions, which the builders learn from experience. Once you've got your cob ready, you then just slop it onto the wall in great shovelfuls. Cob building is an ecological and environmentally-friendly method of building, because it uses entirely natural materials which are extremely cheap. There’s no pollution at all, it’s not giving off any harmful chemicals into the soil or gases into the air or anything noxious at all."
Devon red soil: the very best there is
"A good loam is best - that's why more than half the cob buildings in Britain are in Devon, because the famous Devon Red soil is the very best there is for making cob. It makes a nice mixture and sits together nicely, but doesn't set too hard. Devon has always had a lot of cob buildings and many of them are still there. They survive for hundreds of years - it’s a very durable material. In the course of this project, I discovered that 45 of the 130 buildings in our village of Shobrooke are officially listed as of historical or architectural importance, and 30 of those 45 are made of cob."
Leaving my mark
"We also had a Demonstration Day on the site when people were invited to turn up at any time during the day wearing their filthiest old clothes and welly boots to join in trampling on the cob and stamping it down and making mud bricks and all sorts of interesting things. Quite a few people came along - about 60 adults at intervals during the day, as well as parties of 10 and 11 year old schoolchildren on organised trips - and they were able to join in and have a go at doing it themselves. It was great fun to lay my own little bit of cob, which was specially marked by the builder with my initials."
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