Collecting soil ingredients

All successful adobe projects begin with finding a suitable soil. Clay is the glue which holds everything else in the mix together so it is essential that the soil has some in it. Almost as important as clay is that the soil also contains sand with a nice mix of particle sizes down to and including silt.

Sometimes the perfect mix of clay, sand and silt can be found in a natural soil mix. But if the clay part is not quite right or some sand particle sizes are missing this can be corrected. A good starting point is to try to locate a soil that contains a fairly sticky clay with relatively high binding power. The right sand can usually be found or purchased separately and blended in at a later time to perfect the soil mix (a topic we'll cover in another recipe).

TOOLS

PREPARATION