Every now and again I am privileged to be pointed in the direction of something special in and around Chiang Mai. Last Friday was one of those occasions.

My good friend Ally has been doing some work for  Panyaden School who are presently constructing an innovative new school for children of  kindergarten up to Prathom 6 ages. This is no ordinary school.

It is being constructed within an environmentally friendly philosophy, using natural and renewable resources.

The main construction materials are Bamboo and Rammed Earth and it is quite something to see.

For me it is a leading example of taking a step back in order to take a step forward to protect the future for our children on this fragile planet.

The Panyaden School has been developed in order to combine the modern day curriculum with the learning of natural wisdom and real life skills within a Buddhist cultural setting.

You can find all the details of the aims and objectives of this fantastic project at the school website.

The school site is situated on the left hand side of the  Canal Road, that takes you out of Chiang Mai city from Suthep Road, shortly after the Samoeng/Hang Dong Rd intersection.

Currently the entrance is via an unmade road, all that will change into a purpose built road system. When you travel down this track, you suddenly come across the expansive site where work is well underway.

The designs of the buildings under construction are a testament to the strength and versatility of Bamboo, an abundant and very cost effective resource in Thailand.

Several different varieties of Bamboo are used depending on their individual characteristics and the job at hand.

All the Bamboo is sorted, straightened and treated at Chiang Mai Life Construction (CLC) nearby which we also visited a little later.

On entering the construction site we were greeted warmly by one of the ‘foremen’ who eagerly pointed us toward some local herb tea brewing on a small fire out side a bamboo house’.

Both Ally and myself partook of this very refreshing brew.

Close to this building was a store holding neatly stacked  earthen bricks and also some prepared bamboo awaiting use in the construction.

One of the buildings looks much larger than the others, it’s the Assembly Hall,  a huge construction, reminiscent of a gigantic pre-historic dinosaur skeleton in its present stage of construction. The natural design with its graceful curves makes it not just a building, but also a work of art, worthy of a place in any gallery big enough to hold it.

Nearby is another building of similar design, somewhat smaller and a little closer to completion.

Towards the rear of the site are the ‘classrooms’. Presently, the main work here is on the rammed earth walls.

During our visit we watched as several teams of workers continually pounding away, with huge wooden and metal tools, at the earth that was packed in between bamboo retainers that will be removed once the wall is finished.

Each wall takes about 4 – 5 days to ram & after that, they need to be left to dry for a couple of months before the bamboo roof is placed on top of the rammed earth load bearing walls.

Sand bags are used to create cavities on their removal later.

Once the ramming stage is completed and the whole wall stands in place the work is far from finished.

Nearby we saw another set of labourers working on a ‘completed’ wall, brushing the rough surfaces smooth.

Behing the main site is a small, specially constructed ‘workers village’, built using the same method employed on the main site. Here you see the tool shed built with Adobe walls.

Bamboo is seen all around the school and its not just for construction. It’s being planted for it’s beauty and various uses that this flexible material can be utilised.

There are plans to have bamboo walkways all around the school, it will be a wonderful place to encourage children to grow and learn .

Planting of trees, bamboo and other plants is well underway and in the future the school will be farming it’s own food in the organic gardens to follow on from the construction period.

Ally pointed out the extensive thinking put into every aspect of this project;

with pipes having been laid all around the site , which will drain away excess rain waters into the lake and basically work as a continual cleaning system for the water contained within it.

I, for one , cannot wait to see the finished School and envy the children fortunate enough to end up learning here.

After a quick coffee at Bugs Coffee, back towards Chiang Mai on the Canal Road, we popped into the Chiang Mai Life Construction, where along with sorting, straightening, and treating all the Bamboo prior to use at the school, this innovative company have experimented with different types of earthen walls to find the most suitable for use in Chiang Mai, with respect to the weathers these walls will have to cope with.

We were lucky enough to be there at a time when the man behind this project, Markus Roselieb from Austria, was taking a group around the complex and explaining some of the processes. His enthusiasm for his project is clear as is his knowledge of the processes in use.

I listened with great interest as he talked about the variety of earthen walls they have tested, including Adobe, Rammed Earth and even Wattle and Daub.

For the Thai climate rammed earth & adobe walls seem to be most suitable. However, Markus explained that Wattle and Daub can only be used as interior/non weight baring walls as they do not have the strength or durability, but are excellent sound absorbers.

Markus explained the importance of protecting earth walls against ground water by raising their foundations above the ground to prevent rapid deterioration.

Today’s visit rates as one of the most interesting days I have had in a long while and one that gave real hope that if more people can follow such examples of environmentally friendly forward thinking, then our dream of providing a better future for our children may well come true.