Seven Myths About Bousillage: How Creole Buildings Were Really Made

Last week I talked a little about what bousillage is. This time we’re investigating what it isn’t. Specifically, there are seven commonly held misconceptions associated with bousillage. This information comes out of podcasts on the topic I recently recorded with Marcy Frantom and Max Turner of Quality Finish, Inc. To hear the complete audio interview, visit natchitochespreservation.ning.com or search for “Natchitoches” on iTunes.

Ingredients and Techniques

Bousillage contains animal hair–deer hair in particular. This is an honest mistake. One of the ways people used to keep bousillage from dusting off into their formal rooms was to cover it with lime plaster. One common component of this plaster was horse hair. The moss mixed into the bousillage often resembles curly black hair, as well.

There is a consistent “master” recipe for bousillage. There are two actually two types of bousillage that were used in Natchitoches Parish. There’s the clay/moss mix, and then there’s an adobe variant that includes dried brick and straw or another similar binding material. The Cook’s cabin at Oakland plantation contains this adobe material. Additionally, south Louisiana moss may have been imported at times to make bousillage since it is longer and may have been perceived as a better quality binding agent.

Children made the bousillage. Making this historic building material was long, hard work, and somewhat dangerous. It certainly wasn’t a child’s activity. Where children were able to help was in the patch work, which was required each year to keep the material from cracking and falling out. This was especially critical for the chimneys, which could quickly degrade into a fire hazard if not maintained. Because the bousillage building tradition ended by about WWII, people probably remember repairs rather than the building process.

Misconceptions About Safety

Bousillage houses could be built in a day. Mud of any sort requires time to dry completely. Walls of it could take up to a year to cure completely. Bousillage required several days to mix and mellow before it was ready for use. Even then, walls could reliably be built two to three feet at a time. Each new section would be allowed to firm up (about a week) before another was built on top of it.

As an “Earth plaster,” bousillage is naturally safe and clean. Any material that comes out of dirt will have micro-organisms and allergens throughout. Bacteria and any number of fungi could flourish in its environment. That’s why limewash, which has natural antiseptic properties, was often used to cover it.

Because it’s dirt, bousillage is inherently unsafe and primitive. This is not quite the case either. In addition to being a terrific insulator, bousillage was the most efficient and freely available building material for this area. Some of these structures still exist in our area as a testament to its sturdiness. And, using lime or wood, it could be dressed up.

Fire was used to dry bousillage faster. Some folks have taken scorching on older bousillage to mean it was kiln dried or fires were built close to the structure to speed up the drying process. Taking into account the possibility of cracking due to uneven drying, and the danger of burning down the wood part of the structure, fire was probably not employed for this use. The scorch marks on early bousillage were more like due to oil lamps hung near the walls over the years.