Adobe Building -  Paquime Style

Over a year ago we negotiated and purchased a block and a half of raw land from the Municipality of Casas Grandes as the site for our home and a future bed and breakfast complex.  The property is at the edge of the village and overlooks Paquime and the Museum of Northern Cultures.  As well, the property overlooks public land adjacent and west of the museum; it is designated for an archeological and nature preserve.  There is an unobstructed 30 mile, 180 degree view of the desert, river valley, and mountain ranges, including the Cerro Moctezuma, Cerro Indio, and Las Fortunas Mountains.

In respect to the rich Pueblo Indian culture that once existed here, and in order to give our future guests a better sense of the history and culture of the region, we researched the techniques and style of building at Paquime.  We were lucky that we befriended a number of archeologists that frequent the area.  Dr. Betty Bagwell was in Casas Grandes for almost one year working on writing her thesis.  She referred me to a number of good books and a detailed study of the soil used in the walls at Paquime.  Dr. Carlos Caraveo’s sister Bertha is a good friend of Sabina’s.  Carlos met with me at UTEP in El Paso where he now teaches and lent me a couple of the most relevant volumes on architecture of the extensive Charles DePeso study on Paquime.  As a teenager, Carlos worked on the Paquime dig with DePeso.  Also my friend, Jorge Aguilar, an engineer by profession who was involved in helping get the museum established, gave me a copy of the Contreras report on the Paquime adobe building technique.

Essentially, the Indians used a form system in adobe building.  This is called poured or puddled adobe.  They made an a typical clay/sand adobe mix, and poured the mix into slip forms, creating large blocks, instead of making and stacking the typical 8”x16” adobe blocks.  They hardened their adobe mix by adding soft caliche, which they extracted near the site.  In essence they were making mud cement.  This made sense to my adoberos and myself.  Why haul the dirt, make and dry the block, then move the block to stack it on the wall, when you can haul the dirt to the site, mix it, and put it right in the wall.  The following photos are our updated version of poured adobe, we stabilized our mix with cement and used both horizontal and vertical rebar reinforcement.  With the supporting and functional vigas we brought down from the Sierras, our resulting house that could be called a “Pueblo Revival Style.”  In building our prototype home, we also worked on the roofs with several lightweight, insulating concrete techniques.  We have also developed a Kiva style Rumford fireplace using local lava rock.

Inquire about our adobe building workshops.  

The following is an article I wrote for an adobe building magazine two years ago, it should help give you an overview of the history of the Casas Grandes area:

Adobes of Casas Grandes, Chihuahua (1,300 Years)

Jack W. Anderson

The Chichimeca scouts woke from their dreams to the blazing, blue skies of dawn.  Their travels had been long, but they had found a good spot for their camp.  To the west were the great mountains and to the east many days of the desert sands.  This green valley sheltered them with tall trees, while the soil on either side of the river was dark and rich.  They had discovered a spring with sweet water at the bottom of a hill close by.   The outline of the low mountains gently framed their guiding star Quetzalcoatl (Venus) in the mornings. The high winds sang them a song of the magic and spirit of the land in this place.  They sent a runner to bring the others.  They called this place Paquime.  They built their houses from the earth and prospered.

When the Spanish explorer Balthasar de Obregon arrived in 1565, he came upon their ruins. The golden colored buildings were long abandoned (115 years).  He called them “Casas Grandes” (Big Houses).  He described them: “The houses reached up to six or seven floors, had magnificent patios and plastered walls, and were painted with many colors and drawings.” The clay the Chichimecas used for earth building was strong, being naturally stabilized (18% lime).  It allowed them to engineer 7-storey adobe structures and their craftspeople to create pottery, utensils, and art.  There is evidence that Paquime had 3,000 inhabitants when it was destroyed around 1410-1450 AD by an adversarial force.  The Chichimecas (700-1450 AD) at Paquime were Hopi, led then, as today, by the Bear Clan.  According to archaeologist Joe Ben Sanders, who has exhaustively studied petroglyphs at the Three Rivers site in southern New Mexico, there are indications Paquime was destroyed after a dispute with their relatives in the Spider Clan.

Spanish missionaries and settlers arrived in 1661.  The fertile valley was a good place to raise cattle and cultivate crops.  They also built their houses from the earth by making adobe blocks.  They copied the style of their homes in Spain.  Their walls were straight, plastered with the lime they made from piedra azul (blue stone) brought from the mountains.  The name “Casas Grandes” stuck, and the new village grew and became prosperous.  From Casas Grandes other villages were established.  One was called Mata Ortiz.  It was closer to the Sierra Madre Mountains where forests of pine trees grew.  A lumber mill was established which provided vigas and flooring for houses and jobs for the villagers.

One day the orders for the wood stopped.  The mill shut down.  The villagers wanted to stay in their homes, but many of the men had to leave their families.  They walked many miles through the desert to Santa Fe to find jobs.  They sent money back to their wives and returned when there was enough.  Wanting to stay with their families, they looked for ways to earn money in Mata Ortiz.  A young wood-cutter named Juan Quezada, on his journeys to the mountains, found pieces of pottery from the ancient ones.  The painted designs on them were beautiful and inspiring to the young man.  He found clay and taught himself to make pots.  He copied the designs, and then he made up his own. 

The day came when Juan had to leave his family again for the long walk north.  This time he took with him six of his pots.  His journey took him through Palomas where he stopped at a store.  He was thrilled; he sold his pots for enough that he didn’t have to make the long walk.  He returned home to make more.  Several years passed, and a man came knocking on his door.  His name was Spencer MacCallum, and he had pictures of his pots.  Spencer wanted more, so Juan made more.  Then Spencer came back and paid him to not just make more, but to make better ones, the best he could do.  The pots got better and better, and other people came.  Juan taught his sons and daughters how to make the pots.  Their cousins wanted to learn, and they taught their neighbors.  Now, many people come to the village for pots.  They take them all over the world.  More than 400 of the 2,400 villagers make pots.  They don’t have to make the long walk for jobs anymore, but can stay with their families.  They call this The Miracle of Mata Ortiz (book by author Walter Parks).

About two years ago Spencer and his wife Emalie, who had been a nurse practitioner on Indian reservations, retired to Casas Grandes.  Spencer and Emalie’s adventurous natures, sensitivity to local cultures, and love of history attracted them to undertake several adobe restorations in Casas Grandes.  They have found friends who share their interest in adobe preservationist, such as Delia Ceballos, Sandi Casillas, Lilvia Soto, and Architect Blanca Chinolla, all of whom have family history in the village.  They all hope Spencer and Emalie’s “fresh eyes” and model work on crumbling buildings will spark an interest locally in adobe restoration. 

Many just see the historic old adobes as run-down buildings, e.g. the comment of a local appraiser who said, “You know the value of this property is just in the land.  You will probably want to tear down the old adobe house.”  It’s another “Miracle” that Casas Grandes has survived the destructive path of the ‘60s style of modernization.  Partly, it was the poor economy in the pueblo for the last half century that saved its historic buildings.  In the 1920’s a railroad station was constructed five miles east of the pueblo, giving rise to a separate town.  The new town, Nuevo Casas Grandes, is much larger than the pueblo and provides services for the region, but it doesn’t have the “sense of place” of the historic pueblo.  Had the economy had been vibrant, as in many other places, the historic buildings of the pueblo would have almost certainly been torn down and replaced with bland concrete construction.

Since their immigration to Casas Grandes in February of 2004, Spencer and Emalie have worked with local builder Luis Tena on restoring three properties, the Nopal Casa and Barn, the House of Three Conchas, and the Professors’s House (in progress).  Luis’s traditional-adobe building experience includes training in adobe conservation at the Museo de las Culturas del Norte (Museum of Northern Cultures), where he is security chief.  He has also worked on the stabilizing the adobe ruins at the archeological site in Paquime.  Luis has a crew of seven adoberos and laborers that he supervises on Spencer and Emalie’s building restorations.  The work is extensive.  Some of the walls and roofs were badly deteriorated and have to be stripped back and rebuilt. In this desert mountain region, the summers can get hot, so many of the ceilings and walls in the older casas are 12 feet high.

New adobes are still made in the area and cost (hold on to your hats Santa Fe residents!) about 2 pesos or 18 cents each.  Labor is also about 18 cents if paid by the adobe.  The replacement canales are scarce, but if found locally cost about $25.  Vigas and latillas can be purchased from the Sierra Madres, about an hour away, but you have to be careful of Mexican wood as it is usually not kiln dried.  There are a few local carpenters who will make windows and doors, and we have even seen examples of some good quality, local furniture.  The local dirt for adobe building is of three types: ancon (some clay), barrito (more clay), and barrial (used on mud roofs).  The interior plaster is simply barrito without any color added.  It has a beautiful, natural warm, earth-tone.  The pictured lime kiln, is an experiment to manufacture lime from limestone from a deposit on nearby Pajarito Mountain.  The Casas Grandes region was noted historically for the high quality exterior plaster made with this technique.

Spencer and Emalie have infused a new interest in adobe preservation in Casas Grandes, but it will take continued efforts by others.  We hope civic officials will take quick measures to encourage the restoration of the many vacant and rapidly deteriorating building in the historic district.   Some of the properties are estates held by family descendants living elsewhere.  They are reluctant to sell because of the property’s sentimental value, but unfortunately, some of the structures are not occupied or maintained.  Other Mexican cities like Zacatecas, Guanajuato, and Queretero, have been successful in the restoration of their historic districts.

Progressive local officials like the new mayor, Juan Flores, and his Economic Director, Jorge Aguilar, are supportive of adobe restoration/building and promoting the image of Casas Grandes under the banner of “Adobes for Artists.”  This can provide both sensitive cultural and economic development.  There are now a number of working or retired Mexican and American potters, writers, painters, and mosaic artists in the community.  The relatively low cost of living provides an affordable option for those with a small income or pension.  There are few code restrictions for the adobe owner/builder.

Where is historic Casas Grandes?  It is in the northern part of the Mexican State of Chihuahua, about four hours southwest of El Paso, Texas, or two hours south of the US/MX border when crossing at either Douglas, Arizona or the Columbus, New Mexico.  Please contact Jack if you are interested in one of our tours or workshops. 

* Jack has attended classes of the Southwest Solar Adobe School and has been a builder of featured southwest style homes in Austin TX.  He has been a member of the Congress of New Urbanism, attending conferences in NY and Portland, and was formerly head of Cultural Affairs for the City of Austin.  Currently, he and Sabina (originally from Chihuahua City) are artists living in Casas Grandes.