The Maloca

“The word Maloca comes traditionally from Colombia and Brazil. A Maloca is an ancestral long house used by the natives of the Amazon. Each community has a maloca with its own unique characteristics. Several families with patrilineal relations live together in a maloca, distributed around the long house in different compartments. In general, the chief of the local descent group lives in the compartment nearest to the back wall of the long house. As well, each family has its own furnace.
During festivals and in formal ceremonies, which involve dances for males, the long house space is rearranged; the centre of the long house is the most important area where the dance takes place. Each maloca has two entrances, for men and for women. Married men and women sleep together, and unmarried men sleep separately, as do unmarried women. A maloca is traditionally surrounded with two gardens: the inner called the kitchen gardens (growing plants such as bananas, papaya, mango and pineapple) and the manioc gardens growing manioc (yuca)”
The Maloca at Re-Green is a Naturally Built Round House, of 101 Square Meters, built with local, reusable, organic materials, mainly Clay, Sand, Straw, Stones and Wood. Different construction techniques have been used, serving different purposes on each wall according to the orientation to the sun. Straw-Bale, Straw-Clay, Cord-Wood, Adobe Bricks, Rammed Earth and Earth-Bags are visible by the visitor all around. A wooden spiral Reciprocal Beam Structure roof, siting on wooden posts and Peter-Posts provides a strong and beautiful hat for the Maloca. The Earth floor allows the visitors to connect directly with and feel the energy of the earth bellow. A Large Rocket Mass Heater provides and energy efficient way to warm up the place during the cold days. Recycled colored glass bottles in the cob walls allow the sun to enter creating beautiful light shades. Located within Re-Green’s property it overlooks the green forest on the south and the blue Greek sea on the north.