Atulya K Bingham is a prize-winning novelist, blogger, and natural builder. In 2011, she found herself out of funds and ended up camping in a Turkish field. There was no power or running water on the land, and she had little outdoors survival knowledge. Atulya soon fell in love with her magical square of Earth and decided to stay. She lived on her beloved Mud Mountain until August 2016, when a particular set of events caused her to leave.
Yabangee recently sat down with Atulya K. Bingham to talk about her experiences in Turkey and what motivated her to build a mud house.
When and why did you move to turkey?
I first visited Turkey in 1988 with a backpack and fell in love with the mixture of Middle Eastern and Mediterranean culture there. I returned year after year until in 1997 when I had finished studying at university. It was then I took the plunge and left the UK forever. That leap was the best thing I ever did, and I never looked back.
What motivated you to leave urban life and move up the mountains?
I had made a couple of terrible business decisions which had basically bankrupted me. I was also incredibly burned out from my teaching job and dying to find some space to write what became my first book Ayşe’s Trail. So I moved with a tent onto what I later called Mud Mountain, initially to recover. I didn’t have to pay rent up there, and therefore could live cheaply. But the experience changed me, and within a few weeks, I understood I wouldn’t return to my old life. Nature was so incredible and magical, it brought me back to life. I learned that I loved building things and creating this world for myself. It was wonderful.
Did you plan to build a home before going to Kabak or the idea came up you later?
My land was actually near Olympos, not Kabak. I had bought it a decade earlier and always planned to have a small house built there at some point, but not one made of mud or anything. I didn’t even know earthbag building existed back then. I also didn’t know the first thing about building and thought I needed a lot of money to construct a home. But after I camped on my land, I soon began to learn some basic construction skills, and other options and ideas began to appear. This is always the way. Once you take a step in the direction of your heart, life begins to help you.
Why did you pick that area to start with? What attracted you to it?
I love the forests, rocks, and mountains of the Olympos valley. It is wild and magical, full of ancient myths and forgotten secrets. The Lycian coast is a very special place and deserves great protection. Back between 2000 and 2009, I also loved the bohemian vibe in Olympos and Cirali. It was so free compared to most other places.
Can you walk us through the process of building a mud house?
There are many types of mud houses, so it depends which technique you use. Traditionally mud homes in Turkey are “kerpiç”. This is a wonderful method of building where you create bricks out of mud and then leave them to dry in the sun. This isn’t how I built my home though. After some research, I chose the earthbag building technique because it’s invincible in an earthquake. It can also handle some flooding, and flooding is a problem in the Antalya area in winter.
Earthbag building involves filling polypropylene sacks with damp clayey earth, laying them in a circle and then tamping them flat with something smooth and heavy. Between each layer of bags, you run two courses of barbed wire. The wire is the tensile strength of the structure and prevents the bags from falling apart in an earthquake. For more details and a step by step guide on how I did it, take a look at my website.
What kind of utilities one of those houses have inside? What kind of difficulties a person living in one may face?
I lived very simply with solar power. But you can add whatever utilities you like really, just like any other house. You run power cables and water pipes through the walls. I can’t think of any particular difficulties you might face in such a house. They are much warmer in winter than a concrete apartment, so heating is easy. In summer mud houses are lovely and cool. In storms, you feel safe because they are so strong. They are amazing at soundproofing, and fireproof too. Once you’ve lived in a mud house, you never want to live inside concrete again. It’s horrible stuff that ravages the environment in so many ways.
Any advice you would like to give to someone who wants to build a mud house as you did?
The most important thing is to find your space. Find a piece of land that can hold you, because the land is by far the most important being, not your house. Next, you have to sit and listen to your piece of earth, watch it, feel it before beginning anything, because that relationship between you and your space is what will save you or break you. Let the place speak to you. Hear the trees and animals, and begin to work with them rather than against them. For more information on that, take a look at the Mud Mountain blog on my website.
How about your books?
Nowadays, I’m a published author of 4 books and a natural builder, but it really was that wonderful piece of land in Turkey that transformed me into what I am today. My first novel, Ayşe’s Trail, won an award. Mud Ball, my second and most popular book, is the story of how I built my earthbag house. My latest book Dirt Witch has just been released and covers those first magical and sometimes terrifying first months when I camped alone with the scorpions and snakes. All my books so far have been set in Turkey. Readers can read excerpts and learn how to buy them here.
What are your future plans now?
A couple of years ago due to a number of events, I sold my mud home and left Turkey. I was becoming so sad about the destruction of the amazing forests there. At the moment I’m in Spain where I’m building a new off-grid space in the wild. But the future? Who knows?
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Atulya is now creating a new off-grid world in northern Spain. You can follow her current adventures and learn plenty more about natural building and off-grid living on her popular website.
Photos courtesy of Melissa Maples.
