Tierra Buena Home and Garden, LLC

Tierra Buena Home and Garden, LLC A Tucson-based, alternative building consultant. Specialties:
• Earthen and strawbale construction

ROC 347660
Tierra Buena Home and Garden, LLC is a Tucson-based general contractor specializing in straw and earthen construction. Our specialties also include:
• Smart-sized, small, and tiny homes
• Creative salvage and reuse
• Integrated site design and custom patio improvements

We offer the following services:
• Design + build of residential and small commercial projects
• General contractor s

ervices for designers and owners
• Consulting including design development, project approach advising, and construction
detailing
• Workshops and educational opportunities
• Owner-builder assistance
• Developing context-sensitive housing with a focus on natural materials and modest home sizes

Coming soon! We’re excited to announce the following upcoming developments
• Manufacture and installation of prefabricated straw wall panels – coming fall of 2024
• Predesigned and model home and casita kits ready to be shipped to and installed at your project site – likely coming spring 2025

Last Saturday I had the distinct pleasure of leading a workshop on and light frame construction at The School of Archi...
03/16/2026

Last Saturday I had the distinct pleasure of leading a workshop on and light frame construction at The School of Architecture at their campus at the Cattletrack arts compound in Scottsdale. The workshop was part of their high performance natural building materials class. We installed bales in a couple wall sections using the BOEBS (bales on end between studs) method, and demoed splitting bales and got to play with mud plasters at the end of the day.

One of the developers who was highlighted during October’s field trip in was Eli Spevak of Orange Splot development...
11/10/2025

One of the developers who was highlighted during October’s field trip in was Eli Spevak of Orange Splot development company. We toured a variety of his projects that showcase his ability to realize ambitious visions that test the boundaries of local zoning codes and provide a variety of housing options for Portland residents.

He’s created two co-housing communities (Cully Greens and Cully Grove) that include community gardens, attractive architecture, comfortable common areas/buildings, a food forest, and a hempcrete sauna. His project Flora and Ulysses functions as a boarding house of sorts, and he’s created other attractive multi-housing developments using middle housing code reforms and land divisions.

He’s long been an outspoken advocate for zoning code reform, pushing for the changes that have made many of his projects possible.

Before he started developing his own projects he was a Project Manager w Habitat for Humanity in Oregon and Pennsylvania. His business’s name, and some of his projects (flora and ulysses) are named after children’s books.

Sharing some belated finish shots of the we applied to my casita at the end of September. What I had envisioned as a...
11/04/2025

Sharing some belated finish shots of the we applied to my casita at the end of September. What I had envisioned as a 2 coat plaster ended up being a 2.5 coat plaster - while the second coat was still wet we came back w a finish coat with chopped straw screened to 1/4”. the coarser bits of the chopped straw that snuck thru the screen def made the finish coats more laborious. For a future application I will probably look into another fiber.

As I mentioned in my previous post, the plaster uses , chopped straw, and type s lime for stabilization. The plaster coat has held up great to the last few storms of the monsoon season.

The first and second coats were applied with wooden floats and compresssed w a larger wooden float. the final coat was applied w a metal trowel and hit w a sponge float before burnishing w a metal pool trowel.

Once again major thanks to Bert Scott for his assistance with the plaster application. We had a couple no shows with laborers and his extra hustle made our two-person workflow doable.

Small developer tour of PortlandI’m heading home today after another excellent small developer field trip w Alliance, t...
10/06/2025

Small developer tour of Portland
I’m heading home today after another excellent small developer field trip w Alliance, this time to Portland OR.

Takeaway 1: zoning/land use code reforms do work to incentivize housing development and begin to address housing shortages in/around cities. Multiple rounds of code reforms in Portland create flexibility for the development of adus, tiny homes and middle housing. In this market and regulatory environment, small developers are responding, and construction sites and new developments are popping up throughout the areas east of downtown that we toured.

These zoning reforms have come from concerted advocacy by developers and the greater community that have been able to overcome the voices of nimbys and reach a receptive city government. Noteworthy changes include the elimination of parking minimums in many cases, the allowance of increased housing density and variety (fourplexes, six plexes, cottage clusters, adus), the elimination of many restrictions relating to tiny houses, and the enabling of middle housing land division strategies (fee simple subdivisions, condo divisions) to help create homeownership/for sale opportunities.

Casitas, duplexes, and other structures are sprouting in formerly SFR neighborhoods. Some developers are knocking down existing homes, but a lot of developers are preserving existing homes and building around them due to the Increased flexibility around siting in the code reforms. Property values are increasing (reportedly a 30% increase in property values after passage of the zoning reforms due to increased site developability).

The increased density has enabled the creation and/or enrichment of neighborhood hubs, so you see strips of commercial w restaurants and coffee shops and other amenities popping up to serve growing demand. the availability of transit, bike paths, and proximity to amenities allow households to reduce the number of cars needed and even enable households to be car free. Some areas, like the district around Division St, have seen dramatic transformation including increase in density, traffic, commercial activity, and property values.

My casita has been getting some much needed TLC recently. New Saltillo tile baseboards inside and out, and a 2-coat cl...
09/22/2025

My casita has been getting some much needed TLC recently. New Saltillo tile baseboards inside and out, and a 2-coat clay-lime exterior plaster to replace a weathered clay paint over the original clay-straw plaster that went on back in 2016. Major thanks to Bert Scott for his work on the trowel and tile setting. My plaster mix features site soil (screened to 1/8”), chopped straw (screened to 1/2” cuz I’m lazy), and type s lime. These Plaster coats are about a 1/4” thick, which is a big contrast to the high-fiber basecoat I put on originally, which went on in a single coat that was 2-4” thick.
Scratch coat is on and brown/finish coat should be on in the next week or so.

Since December I’ve been diving into trainings on smallscale development trainings w the , which have been so great. Mo...
04/06/2025

Since December I’ve been diving into trainings on smallscale development trainings w the , which have been so great. Most of the trainings have been online, so I jumped at the opportunity to see some small development projects in person and do some networking irl.

This weekend I’m in northwest Arkansas in the and area touring the projects and hearing how their developers put them together. Local governments have made some major zoning code amendments to allow denser developments, and local small developers have responded. There’s a really healthy ecosystem of development professionals, lenders, and local government staff coming together to make exciting projects happen. Super inspired to come back to Tucson and continue evolving the vision for

Big thanks to David Olsen of Media Zocalo for the pro photos of the ed units over at . His shots really make them sh...
12/13/2024

Big thanks to David Olsen of Media Zocalo for the pro photos of the ed units over at . His shots really make them shine ✨

Phase 1 of the development of is complete! I’m excited about the new tenants who will be moving into the newly remodel...
11/18/2024

Phase 1 of the development of is complete! I’m excited about the new tenants who will be moving into the newly remodeled/expanded units, and excited for them to make the spaces their homes/their own. They seemed to really fall in love with the spaces. They'll be moving in starting late November into early December. I’m also looking forward to having some positive cashflow!

The minor subdivision has been approved by City Planning and Development Staff, and will hopefully be approved by Mayor and Council soon and then recorded/finalized. Once that's done we'll be able to apply for permits for the first of the that will be built on the new lot out front.

We currently have 2 draft floor plans/models for duplexes we'll be building at the site, along with a model for a 12'x24' studio/guest quarters also to be built onsite. Now that we've wrapped up the remodel, we'll be transitioning into design development/construction documentation, estimating, figuring out financing, and hammering out details for the panel system we'll be using for the different models.

Full circle (well almost) way back in the fall of 2018 I gutted this house in central for the previous owner. it was b...
10/05/2024

Full circle (well almost)

way back in the fall of 2018 I gutted this house in central for the previous owner. it was built by an old ‘railroader’ (a guy who worked on the railroads) and the walls were covered with darkly stained, redwood planks, and so were the ceilings (ceiling planks are Doug fir). The previous owner suggested selling me the place back then, but I wasn’t ready for it - I wanted to be building new rather than remodeling and I didn’t have the cash for an extensive .



Fast forward to last fall, when I was finishing up my contractors licensing requirements, i decided to start investing in , and a family member had some capital they wanted to invest in a joint venture. I circled back to this property and the previous owners were wanting to sell. After some negotiations we closed the sale a month later, on September 1st.

We got to work on roofing and the grounds, and by December my plans were approved for the remodel of the main house and guest quarters. It’s my first remodel of this extent, and at times it’s been overwhelming, but working on this old house has been an engaging challenge. There’s always some little curve ball waiting around the corner and all the old materials have their own stories to tell.

We reused and highlighted as much of the existing/salvaged materials as possible, including the old cabinet and closet doors and the wood of the ceilings, and the original concrete and flagstone floors.

Today we passed our final inspections, and we’ll be putting the finishing touches on the interior and the patio spaces and the plan is to get the place rented out for November. I’ll try to share more details about the space soon, but for now I wanted to share a little of the story of this place.

Major thanks to the many hands that have made this happen, especially the TBHG team, my family, our subcontractors, suppliers, reviewers and inspectors, and utility workers.
Much love 🙏

Last December we removed the casement windows as part of the remodel at , and a number of the frames came out intact. ...
10/05/2024

Last December we removed the casement windows as part of the remodel at , and a number of the frames came out intact. I’ve been wanting to do something with the frames for awhile now, and had some extra time after finishing fencing over here , so he built these sweet for me that’ll be used to store lumber and other linear goods. They even have some sweet retractable arms (casement levers) that can be used to store cables and other hanging goods!

While I was in Northern New Mexico last weekend I had the opportunity to tour the .publicprefab panel fabrication facil...
09/17/2024

While I was in Northern New Mexico last weekend I had the opportunity to tour the .publicprefab panel fabrication facility outside of Santa Fe. They design high performance homes, and manufacture prefab panels using light framing, dense pack cellulose, and high performance membranes. It was really exciting to see their level of attention to detail/craft, innovative panel system, and hardworking team w/ a broad experience base.

These photos don’t do them justice I recommend checking out their profile/website for better photos and info on their system, services and company. They have panel production facilities throughout the US and into Canada, regular trainings for builders and installers, and a network of installers to help clients and builders make their projects a reality.

Had a fun day volunteering at the Habitat for Humanity Tucson CHUCK Panel factory in Flowing Wells as we continue to lay...
09/05/2024

Had a fun day volunteering at the Habitat for Humanity Tucson CHUCK Panel factory in Flowing Wells as we continue to lay the groundwork for Tierra Buena’s panel production operation. They have an impressive facility and system which has essentially halved their build times and they’ve built the panels for about 30 homes during their year and a half in operation of the CHUCK. Their system is easy to learn and it was a fun group of Habitat staff, future homebuyers, and volunteers working together.

Address

Tucson, AZ

Telephone

(520) 975-3533

Website

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