A spiral straw bale home in Ireland.

This is a spiral straw bale house in County Mayo, Ireland. The design is based on the geometry of the nautilus shell. It stands on a foundation of local limestone. The house was built in 2003 by the then Amazonails, now Barbara Jones of Straw Works and Bee Rowan of Strawbuild with the help of over 100 volunteers, 80% of them women with no previous construction experience.

In the natural building community it's not so unusual to find natural homes built by women. The house was Europe’s first two-storey load bearing straw bale house, that's where the roof is supported on straw bale walls alone. There is no internal timber frame. It was shortly followed by the UK's first two-storey straw bale home (below).