Building with Stovewood in Eastern Europe (c. 1895–1965)

Abstract

Stovewood construction refers to methods of building walls with short logs or cut pieces of wood, arranged crosswise and laid in a bed of mortar instead of being nailed. In this paper, the history of stovewood construction in tsarist Russia and in its successor states and territories is discussed, based on existing literature and field surveys. From 1895 to 1914, in the Russian Empire, stovewood construction was developed and promoted by professionals and received government support. This process continued to be used in the Soviet Union and in Poland, both between and after the wars. Other variants of stovewood construction also developed and became popular without any official support—in effect, they became a form of vernacular architecture. Both these two groups of stovewood constructions are still represented by hundreds of specimens in north-east Poland.

Keywords:

• stovewood
• cordwood
• stackwall
• Russia
• Poland

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 Nowadays, the construction is also used for domes and vaults, occasionally.

2 See Tishler, “Stovewood Construction.”

3 See Jenkins, “A Stove-wood House”; Perrin, “Wisconsin’s Stovewood Architecture”; and Perrin, “Wisconsin’s Stovewood Walls.”

4 See Couillard, “La Vallée de l’Outaouais”; Moholy-Nagy, Native Genius in Anonymous Architecture, 195; and Ritchie, Canada Builds.

5 See Ritchie, “Log and Timber Structures,” 4.

6 See Šťastný and Št’astná, Krčkové chalupy; Szewczyk, Budownictwo z polan opałowych, 54–5.

7 See Hagman, “A Technology in Permanent Transition,” 147.

8 Sveen, “Kubbehus og andre murte vedhus”; Šťastný and Št’astná, Krčkové chalupy; O. Hagman, Danviksklippan. Accessed November 29, 2022. https://kubbhus.se/exempel/aeldre%20svenska%20kubbhus/danviksklippan.

9 See Henstridge, Building the Cordwood Home; Roy, How to Build Log-End Houses. See also Gladwin Hill, “Dream Houses Become Reality at U.N. Conference,” The New York Time, June 6, 1976, 24; Lansdown, Watts, and Sparling, Housing for the North; Lansdown et al., Stackwall: How to Build it.

10 This term was popularised in the 1970s by American proponents of stovewood construction (see Henstridge, Building the Cordwood Home) and by magazines such as Mother Earth News; see “The Return of the Cordwood House,” Mother Earth News 47 (1977); Bruce Woods, “A Century (or More) of Cordwood Homes,” Mother Earth News 48 (1977); “How to Build a Cordwood Garage,” Mother Earth News 49 (1978).

11 “Stackwall” seems to be used more commonly in Canada. See Lansdown et al., Stackwall: How to Build it; Shockey, Stackwall Construction.

12 Recently, stovewood was also used in modern buildings, such as the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership in Kalamazoo College in Michigan (arch. Jeanne Gang, 2014); and the Uruguay Pavillion for Expo 2015 in Milan, designed by architect Javier Díaz.

13 In the 1960s, Jaroslaw Šťastný and Jarmila Št’astná (Krčkové chalupy) made a comprehensive study of stovewood construction development and dissemination in two territories in the north of the Czech Republic. In the 1990s, Karsten Karstensen (Knubbehus: byggeskikk i arbeiderstrøk) examined the history of stovewood constructions in Norway, especially near Oslo. Recently, Olle Hagman (“Wood Masonry in Sweden”) has described the history and dissemination of stovewood buildings in Sweden. However, we still do not know whether the exchange of relevant construction knowledge took place between these countries.

14 Such a hypothesis was originally put forward by William H. Tishler, “Stovewood Construction,” 131.

15 See Szewczyk, Budownictwo z polan opałowych.

16 See Mazets and Szewczyk, “Budownictwo z drewna opałowego.”

17 See Kusznerko and Szewczyk, “Budownictwo z polan opałowych”; Gołębiowska and Grynczel, “Przykłady budownictwa”; Sołowińska, “Budownictwo z polan opałowych”; Czarkowska and Kuczyńska, “Domy drzewowapienne”; Kurnicka, Pietrusewicz, and Szewczyk, “Budownictwo z materiałów miejscowych”; Dobrońska and Szewczyk, “Budynki z nietypowych materiałów.”

18 In Belarus, the most extensive surveys were performed by an amateur historian, Uladzimir Prykhach, a journalist and a maths teacher at secondary school in Smorgon. He published his findings in local magazines and newspapers, such as Ašmânskі vesnіk (2014, no. 60), Astraveckaâ praўda (2014, no. 28), Svetly šlâh (2014, no. 1; 2020, no. 6), and Règіânal′naâ gazeta (2015, nos 32 and 33).

19 Šenval′dʺ, “Nesgoraemyâ postrojki.”

20 Vershok was an obsolete Russian unit of length; 1 vershok = 4.445cm.

21 See Šenval′dʺ, “Nesgoraemyâ postrojki,” 691.

22 In 1907, selected photos by Neverovich were published in an ethnography treatise: Haruzin, Slavjanskoe žiliŝe (Annex, photos 6, 8, 14, 18–20, 29, 60, 61–3, 66).

23 Neverovich was awarded with posts in self-government of the nobility; namely, on February 1, 1904, he was electeded the Marshal of Nobility in Belostok County; from September 4, 1905, to 1906, he was the Marshal of Nobility in Grodno County; and from 1906, Neverovich was elected the Marshal of Nobility in Grodno Governorate. In the Russian Empire, nobility self-government was state controlled and the key posts had to be approved by official state administration. Thus, paradoxically, nobility self-government facilitated governmental control over the society and enabled tsarist administration to use self-government posts to reward the most loyal elements of the local society.

24 Fire prevention was one of the key concerns of intellectual elites of that time. Such a concern was revealed by journal articles, state commissions’ reports, agricultural societies’ sessions, etc., as in the following example: “Much importance is attached to a congress of some 250 Zemstvo officials which has been convened to meet at the Ministry of Agriculture and Imperial Domains. The special object of the congress is to discuss means for the prevention of village conflagrations, which, like an epidemic, regularly recur every year during the months of May, June, July and August. […] It is quite a common occurrence for an entire village of 100, 150, and 200 peasants’ dwellings and their appurtenances to be laid in ashes. The primary object is the provision of some kinds of fireproof material for the roof and gable walls of cottages and huts and grain barns. The congress will be empowered to offer premiums to inventors […] of the most effective fireproof sheating or concrete” (Kennard and Peacock, “Prevention of Fires,” 385).

25 Nevěrovičʺ, Na pomoŝ′ derevně! However, it is not clear when the first edition was published.

26 These editions included: Nevěrovičʺ, Sel′skoe ognestojkoe stroitel′stvo; Nevěrovičʺ, Ognestojkie postrojki tipa N.G. Nevěroviča; Nevěrovičʺ, Kak že stroit′sâ derevne?

27 Neverovich’s critics called that number into question: “Neverovich’s exhibition farmhouse in Kazan, built in 1909, was adorned with an inscription about his entrance doors that it had been constructed for merely 7 days. It was to stupefy the comon people who did not know that as many as 297 people had been hired to construct the farmhouse” (Rotert, Ognestojkіe stroitel′nye materialy, 12–13).

28 J.K., “Poniewież,” Kurier Litewski 87 (1910), 5; “Wystawa w Poniewieżu,” Kurjer Warszawski 90, no. 194 (1910), 4.

29 See Neveravičiaus, “Pigios, stipros.”

30 See Tilinskij, Sel′skoe stroitel′noe iskusstvo, 134–40.

31 See Milicynʺ, Ognestojkoe stroitel′stvo, 34-39.

32 See Mačinskij, Tehnika sel′skago ognestojkago stroitel′stva, 147–9. All the cited names refer to stovewood in local Russian dialects.

33 Nevěrovičʺ, “Zapiska po voprosam.”

34 According to Čerepica, Gorod-krepost′ Grodno, 316.

35 The article was then published in one of popular calendars (see Szopa, “W sprawie odbudowy wsi”).

36 See Niewierowicz, Poradnik wiejskiego budownictwa ogniotrwałego, 113–15.

37 See Mikołaj Niewierowicz, “W sprawie budynków glinobitych,” Tygodnik Rolniczy 11, nos 5–6 (1927), 61–3.

38 “Dobry początek,” Tygodnik Rolniczy 11, nos 31–2 (1927), 321–3.

39 For example in July, 1931, a cordwood masonry workshop took place in Łuck, now in north-west Ukraine. See an official announcement [L.1366/1/Aodb.], in Lubelski Dziennik Wojewódzki 15 (1931), 265.

40 Niewierowicz, Poradnik wiejskiego budownictwa ogniotrwałego.

41 See Racięcki, Jak należy budować.

42 See Szewczyk. Budownictwo z polan opałowych, 165–8, and the relevant bibliography: ibid., 303–11.

43 These estimations are based on Niewierowicz’s statements (Niewierowicz, Poradnik wiejskiego budownictwa ogniotrwałego, 113–15), Uladzimir Prykhach’s findings (see note 18) and the author’s recent fieldwork. For example, Uladzimir Prykhach has found information about 36 stovewood buildings in the present-day northern Belarussian part of the former Wilno Province; fifteen of those buildings were still in existence in 2016. A dozen or so stovewood buildings existed in Lithuanian part of the former Wilno Province, a few dozen in the former Białystok Province, an unknown number in the former Nowogródek Province. Many more stovewood buildings were constructed in Białystok Province after the Second World War.

44 I.e. Swedish “kubbhus” and Norwegian “kubbehus” (literally: cube house). See [NML], Kubbhus. Accessed July 2, 2022. http://old.stockholmslansmuseum.se/faktabanken/kubbhus/. See also a photo of a stovewood house in Åvinge, Grödinge Parish, Botkyrka Municipality south-west of Stockholm. Accessed July 2, 2022. https://samlingar.kulturarvstockholm.se/index.php/Search/objects/search/kubbhus

45 See Tuliszkowski, Podstawy budownictwa ogniotrwałego, 185–8.

46 According to anonymous interviewees who lived in the vicinity of the then existing stovewood building in Białystok, Ostrowiecka Street, personal communication, May–June, 2004.

47 Piaścik mentioned the use of 45cm thick stovewood walls, mortared with lime mortar and plastered with lime and cement plaster (Przykładowe projekty zagród wiejskich, 11).

48 Łukaszewicz wrote his manual in 1938, but its publication was delayed because of the Second World War and did not appear until 1946. See Łukaszewicz, Ogniotrwałe budownictwo na wsi, 73–4.

49 262 stovewood buildings in the Białystok Region are indexed in Szewczyk, Budownictwo z polan opałowych, 316–21.

50 Dom iz drov. Accessed November 11, 2020. http://ecoferma.livejournal.com/1650.html. See also Szewczyk, Budownictwo z polan opałowych, 82.

51 See “Sel′skoe ognestojkoe stroitel′stvo,” 66–7.

52 See Mačinskij, Krest′ânskoe stroitel′stvo v Rossii, 66.

53 See Pomorcov, Stroitel′naâ Gigiena i Sanitariâ, 80–1.

54 Narkomzem was a shortcut of the People’s Commissariat for Agriculture of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, in 1946 renamed as the Soviet Ministry of Agriculture.

55 See the following examples: Skačkov, “Glinohvorostnye ognestojkie sel′skie žilye postrojki”; Skačkov, “Šire primenât′ mestnye stroitel′nye materialy.”

56 Informations based on anecdotal Russian press notes and rather ephemeral internet resources; for example, Èkodom iz drov i gliny. Accessed November 11, 2020. http://gazeta.rodpomestye.info/statya/903-steny-iz-drov-i-gliny; Banâ iz gliny i drov. Accessed July 4, 2022. https://grebnoykanaldon.ru/banya-iz-gliny-i-drov.

57 For example, in the 1950s at least twelve stovewood houses were built in Uhowo, a village near Białystok (see Kusznerko, “Nowo odkryta grupa 12 budynków”; Kusznerko and Szewczyk, “Budownictwo z polan opałowych w Uhowie”).

58 See Łukaszewicz, Ogniotrwałe budownictwo na wsi; Łukaszewicz, “Budownictwo wiejskie z gliny.”

59 Perrin, “Wisconsin’s Stovewood Architecture,” 8.

60 At least two pieces of information suggest some connections. Firstly, in 2007, the author was informed by the owner of an old stovewood house in Tykocin, north-east Poland, that the Polish Insurance Company called stovewood construction a “Czech wall” (mur czeski). Secondly, old stovewood houses in Mal’ovane and Dolina villages, Mlyniv rayon, Rivne oblast, Ukraine, were built by a Czech minority member, in the 1930s. See Evgenij Cimbalûk and Aleksandra Ûrkova, “Čudo-dom iz dubovyh polen′ev”, Golos Ukrainy, 234 (4984, December 15, 2010), www.golos.com.ua/rus/article/120695).

61 Karsten and Hundt, Beschreibung einer höchst Methode; Thaer, “Ueber die Sundtsche Lehmbau-Methode.”

62 See [P.W.], “Prosty i doświadczony sposób”; Kajetan Krassowski, Sposób stawiania budowli gospodarskich.

63 See Szewczyk, Budownictwo z polan opałowych, 317–21.