November 7, 2025 • 5 mins
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, cam my partner and I love watching Grand Designs Australia.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
You mentioned it many times.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Yes, I come in and I say can we watched
another episode this time and recently they were talking about
earth homes or earthship homes. Had you ever heard of
that before?
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I've heard of the home and I sort of understand it,
I think, but I have done a little bit of
poking around and research this week and.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
It's like, oh my god, yes, so we need to
dig down and find out more about this. Anthony Burke is,
of course the host of ABC's Grand Designs Australia. Anthony,
Good morning.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Good morning, Renee. How are you doing.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
Yes, good, Thank you so much for joining us. Can
you just start off by giving us a brief description
of an earth home or an earthship home?
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Yeah, look at earthship is something that was designed in
the nineteen seventies. It's a sustainable, off grid, fully self
contained home that's designed to get rid of those energy
bills and basically provide all the energy it needs from
the local environment around it. And you know, it's got
lots of things that make that happen. But they're really
an interesting invention from the nineteen seven and he's in America,
(01:01):
and you.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Mentioned that they are from the seventies in America. Is
it something that people I mean, obviously you guys covered
it on the show. Are you seeing kind of more
and more of it coming out these days in the
present day.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Yeah, what's happening is, you know, people are looking for
all sorts of ways to be more sustainable, and they
want to do that cheaply affordably because it can cost
a lot of money. So in that sense, people are
looking back to earthships and the principles that they use
to be sustainable and looking for ways to incorporate them
in contemporary builds. So some people are doing, you know,
full on earthship builds like Matt and Kate down Insignet
(01:35):
they were on the show, YEP, and others are kind
of taking the principles from airthships and using parts of
them to do to upgrade their homes if you like.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
So, what are some of the features that you might
see in one of these homes.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Well, first, the biggest thing is you want to gather
all of that great passive solar energy, so you've got
usually a lot of north facing glass, and that means
the other two or three sides of the house are
usually sort of backed into the earth in some way.
That's why they're called earth ships. So they sort of
have a very stable temperature from the earth that mounds
(02:07):
up around free sides of the house, while the other side,
the fourth side, really faces the sun and is like
a big heat engine, you know. It heats and cools
the house passively. So you'll always see that big sort
of long line of glass and you'll get usually behind
that a garden corridor with a lot of greenery growing
in there, and that helps recycle the gray water that
comes from your shower and you sink and that kind
(02:27):
of stuff. And I guess the other thing you probably
see you won't see so much, but it's happening in
an earthship are these things called earth tubes. And they
basically just a pipe. There's about a meter underground that
runs out to a part of the garden and then
comes back up into the house and that just actually
uses the ambient temperature to equalize whether it's hot or cold,
(02:48):
to stabilize the temperature and have a constant temperature in
the home with no energy use at all.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Okay, amazing, And so we saw on one of your
recent shows. Also, you're in the yes area and you're
speaking about an earth bom, so, yeah, is there a difference.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
There is a bit of a difference. An earthbom is
a type of construction, so that's really like a semi
underground house you're building, you know, literally a kind of
a cave if you like, whereas an earthship really comes
from all the sustainability principles that were really hot, the
hot topic in the seventies because of the oil crisis
and all that kind of stuff, and of course which
are very relevant again today. So there is a little
(03:26):
bit of a difference, but they share a lot of
really good benefits, like those kind of stable temperatures, like
a lot of more greenery in and around your home
a lot, and both of them try as much as
possible to be passive, which means no cost in that
energy kind of equation if you like.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
Yeah, and you talk about temperatures Anthony, Obviously, where we
are here in Canberra and surrounds, we experience those extremes, right,
so extreme summer, winter, all of those things. We get
it all here. And so do you think it'd be
really worthwhile for people listening who are interested in this
sort of thing to look up some of those principles
of earthship homes, earth burm homes and to see if
(04:03):
they can incorporate any of that if they're going to
be building a home here locally.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Absolutely, one hundred percent. There are some really great fundamental
ideas that the airthships sort of embody about building sustainably.
And you know, for us, there's two things there. One
is it's affecting the sort of way you think about
the design of your home, the feel and the look
of your home. But it's also about the lowering the
costs of building a home and doing it. There's a
(04:28):
lot of it is really manual labor for earthships, so
there's a lot of ways to save money by looking
at earthships, I mean spose. The thing that comes with
it is you've got to be ready to kind of
get involved if you're going to do an airthship, because
it takes a bit of work, as you would have
seen from Matt and Kate Insignet.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Now, yeah, absolutely all right, mate.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Well, I know Renee has been very excited in the
lead up to have you on the show. Thank you
so much for coming on and sharing that because it's quite.
It's very interesting, isn't it. You must have seen some
interesting stuff in your travels doing the show, but this
must be sort of top level for you.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
I love this stuff, you know. This is my total
architect nerd brain going crazy, great ideas, and I love
to say that people are just leaning into it and
having a go, you know.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Yeah, yep, one hundred percent. Anthony. Well, it's been a
pleasure to have you on. Thank you so much for
your time this morning and explaining that to us. We
really appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
No problem. Great to talk to you both.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Yeah, cheers, Thanks so much. Anthony Burke, Architecture Professor. As
you said, his nerd brain was going off there, and
host of Grand Signs Australia, Restoration Australia, many many other titles,
Well, cam my partner and I love watching Grand Designs Australia.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
You mentioned it many times.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Yes, I come in and I say can we watched
another episode this time and recently they were talking about
earth homes or earthship homes. Had you ever heard of
that before?
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I've heard of the home and I sort of understand it,
I think, but I have done a little bit of
poking around and research this week and.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
It's like, oh my god, yes, so we need to
dig down and find out more about this. Anthony Burke is,
of course the host of ABC's Grand Designs Australia. Anthony,
Good morning.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Good morning, Renee. How are you doing.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
Yes, good, Thank you so much for joining us. Can
you just start off by giving us a brief description
of an earth home or an earthship home?
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Yeah, look at earthship is something that was designed in
the nineteen seventies. It's a sustainable, off grid, fully self
contained home that's designed to get rid of those energy
bills and basically provide all the energy it needs from
the local environment around it. And you know, it's got
lots of things that make that happen. But they're really
an interesting invention from the nineteen seven and he's in America,
(01:01):
and you.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Mentioned that they are from the seventies in America. Is
it something that people I mean, obviously you guys covered
it on the show. Are you seeing kind of more
and more of it coming out these days in the
present day.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Yeah, what's happening is, you know, people are looking for
all sorts of ways to be more sustainable, and they
want to do that cheaply affordably because it can cost
a lot of money. So in that sense, people are
looking back to earthships and the principles that they use
to be sustainable and looking for ways to incorporate them
in contemporary builds. So some people are doing, you know,
full on earthship builds like Matt and Kate down Insignet
(01:35):
they were on the show, YEP, and others are kind
of taking the principles from airthships and using parts of
them to do to upgrade their homes if you like.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
So, what are some of the features that you might
see in one of these homes.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Well, first, the biggest thing is you want to gather
all of that great passive solar energy, so you've got
usually a lot of north facing glass, and that means
the other two or three sides of the house are
usually sort of backed into the earth in some way.
That's why they're called earth ships. So they sort of
have a very stable temperature from the earth that mounds
(02:07):
up around free sides of the house, while the other side,
the fourth side, really faces the sun and is like
a big heat engine, you know. It heats and cools
the house passively. So you'll always see that big sort
of long line of glass and you'll get usually behind
that a garden corridor with a lot of greenery growing
in there, and that helps recycle the gray water that
comes from your shower and you sink and that kind
(02:27):
of stuff. And I guess the other thing you probably
see you won't see so much, but it's happening in
an earthship are these things called earth tubes. And they
basically just a pipe. There's about a meter underground that
runs out to a part of the garden and then
comes back up into the house and that just actually
uses the ambient temperature to equalize whether it's hot or cold,
(02:48):
to stabilize the temperature and have a constant temperature in
the home with no energy use at all.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Okay, amazing, And so we saw on one of your
recent shows. Also, you're in the yes area and you're
speaking about an earth bom, so, yeah, is there a difference.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
There is a bit of a difference. An earthbom is
a type of construction, so that's really like a semi
underground house you're building, you know, literally a kind of
a cave if you like, whereas an earthship really comes
from all the sustainability principles that were really hot, the
hot topic in the seventies because of the oil crisis
and all that kind of stuff, and of course which
are very relevant again today. So there is a little
(03:26):
bit of a difference, but they share a lot of
really good benefits, like those kind of stable temperatures, like
a lot of more greenery in and around your home
a lot, and both of them try as much as
possible to be passive, which means no cost in that
energy kind of equation if you like.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
Yeah, and you talk about temperatures Anthony, Obviously, where we
are here in Canberra and surrounds, we experience those extremes, right,
so extreme summer, winter, all of those things. We get
it all here. And so do you think it'd be
really worthwhile for people listening who are interested in this
sort of thing to look up some of those principles
of earthship homes, earth burm homes and to see if
(04:03):
they can incorporate any of that if they're going to
be building a home here locally.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Absolutely, one hundred percent. There are some really great fundamental
ideas that the airthships sort of embody about building sustainably.
And you know, for us, there's two things there. One
is it's affecting the sort of way you think about
the design of your home, the feel and the look
of your home. But it's also about the lowering the
costs of building a home and doing it. There's a
(04:28):
lot of it is really manual labor for earthships, so
there's a lot of ways to save money by looking
at earthships, I mean spose. The thing that comes with
it is you've got to be ready to kind of
get involved if you're going to do an airthship, because
it takes a bit of work, as you would have
seen from Matt and Kate Insignet.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Now, yeah, absolutely all right, mate.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Well, I know Renee has been very excited in the
lead up to have you on the show. Thank you
so much for coming on and sharing that because it's quite.
It's very interesting, isn't it. You must have seen some
interesting stuff in your travels doing the show, but this
must be sort of top level for you.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
I love this stuff, you know. This is my total
architect nerd brain going crazy, great ideas, and I love
to say that people are just leaning into it and
having a go, you know.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Yeah, yep, one hundred percent. Anthony. Well, it's been a
pleasure to have you on. Thank you so much for
your time this morning and explaining that to us. We
really appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
No problem. Great to talk to you both.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Yeah, cheers, Thanks so much. Anthony Burke, Architecture Professor. As
you said, his nerd brain was going off there, and
host of Grand Signs Australia, Restoration Australia, many many other titles,
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