The little house is a replica of the artist’s parents’ hand-made Adobe home during China’s cultural revolution. The structure is designed and constructed following the simple techniques for traditional northern Chinese adobe dwelling. Local materials, including clay, sand, straw, recycled barn wood,fallen trees, were collected and used to build the little house. The Little House is a permanent installation at Art Farm, Nebraska.

The interior of the house is pasted with American newspaper articles about China, following the conventional usage of newspaper as wallpaper in this type of dwellings.

The structure will gradually erode in weather and return to earth in about 30-40 years, the typical life span of a building of its type in China.

Adobe bricks being made by pressing the mixture of clay, sand, and straw into a four brick mold of metal lined wood frame. (left)

Completion of the "Mountain Wall. (right)

photo by Ed Dadey

Salvaged lath from old barns is used to sheath the little house to provide a base for applying the grass thatching roofing.

photo by Ed Dadey

Native grasses are cut and bundled into approximately 2' square "Shingles" for thatching the roof. They are layered using a wet clay and lime mortar over the lath. This long strip is about to be raised for the ridge of the little house.

photo by Ed Dadey

The little house in moon light.

photo by Ed Dadey