'The most requested Grand Designs revisit in history': inside the extraordinary Lord of the Rings-style 'cob castle' home in Devon

Kevin 'King of Cob' McCabe first appeared on Grand Designs in 2013 armed only with a grand plan to build a soil and straw masterpiece with his bare hands. Five years later the show revisits his east Devon project to see the finished result - and it's pretty spectacular...
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Jess Denham7 November 2018

The notion of building a 'cob house' from mud and straw seems misplaced, crazy even, in a 21st-century society dominated by new building materials and technologies. But for Kevin 'King of Cob' McCabe, there's no other material like it - and he's committed to showing us why.

The final episode of this 18th series of Grand Designs revisits Kevin five years after 'other Kevin', presenter Kevin McCloud, took viewers to the start of his ambitious self-build project in east Devon.

Back in 2013, all Kevin had was a grand plan to build a soil and straw masterpiece from scratch, which would not only be 'probably the largest cob building on the planet' but meet the highest environmental performance standards ever set in the UK.

Luckily, he also had experience on his side; Kevin is a master in the ancient art of cob building (building houses from a mixture of clay, sand, straw and water), and had built five cob houses locally already, including the one he was living in with his now ex-wife Rose and their three sons.

The designs he'd drawn up were epic in scale - two huge round cob houses connected to each other, one to be used as the main house and the other as an annexe for guests or family members - and Kevin was to build most of it with his bare hands.

"People say Dad wasn't born, but chiselled out of cob," said son Ben at the time. "He’s a cob-building warrior. This will be a utopia of cob awesomeness."

Kevin squared: builder McCabe shows presenter McCloud around his cob home
Channel 4

Unfortunately, Kevin was flexing his skills in Britain, and rain inevitably played unexpected havoc with the timeline and modest £350,000 budget.

Each two-foot layer of cob (built upon concrete foundations) must be left to dry out for at least five days before another is added, meaning he was relying on three months of good weather to finish his 20ft-high structure. When it became clear that he would not finish before winter set in, he decided to pause construction completely for six months.

Ever determined with a steely focus, Kevin returned to the site the following spring, only to face the wettest summer on record. Working 14-hour days and returning home saturated became the norm in a race to get all 2,000 tonnes of cob in place ready for the undulating roof to go on.

Blending in: this 'wildflower meadow' is actually the roof of Kevin's house
Channel 4

Unfortunately, the dire weather took a toll on Kevin’s bank balance, leaving him with just £100,000 to finish everything off. It was not nearly enough, so he halted the project again and went back to full-time work elsewhere.

Come the next May, the roof had been insulated and covered with an eco-friendly plastic membrane, soil and seeds in a bid to grow a wildflower meadow that would blend in with the surrounding landscape.

Kevin set about adding polystyrene to the thick cob walls to adhere to insulation targets and threaded a smart, heat-saving ventilation system through the building.

Still in desperate need of funds, Kevin and Rose sold their existing five-bedroom cob house and received an offer for £1.1million, only for it to fall through just as their hopes of getting the annexe ready to move into had begun to rise.

The 2013 episode left them two-and-a-half-years down the line, with not a single room habitable and no windows installed.

THE BIG REVEAL
Tonight, with "a lot of muddy water under the bridge", 'other Kevin' returns for "the most requested Grand Designs revisit in history" - a grand tour of the finished, 10,000 sq ft cob castle.

Kevin now lives here with his new partner and her children, and it looks every inch the beautiful family home, lime-washed and glazed, with large solar heating panels providing all the energy they need for nine months of the year.

Going green: solar panels provide all the energy needed for nine months of the year

It is incredible to behold on the approach, "like something straight off the cover of a Seventies prog-rock album", marvels McCloud.

Inside it is spectacular, with "the wibbly-wobbly language of cob fully explored to the point of being otherworldly", with a strong "Lord of the Rings feel" to it. The magical-looking spiral cob staircase winding up the centre of the three-storey main house, connecting an arcade-size games room and gym in a sunken basement floor to the main living areas at ground level and the luxurious bedrooms above, makes an impactful statement.

Hobbitesque: this fabulous cob staircase spirals up through three floors

Even the kitchen is made from cob, the bits of straw sticking out give it a charmingly rustic aesthetic. Kevin has handmade much of it, from the cob wine racks to the worktops cut from his own oak tree. Light fittings hang from branches of birch grown on site as part of his carbon-neutral renewable fuel strategy. "It's been a real labour of love," he says fondly.

Cooking on cob: Kevin made the kitchen units and worktops himself
Channel 4

In the living room, a stunning cob fireplace looks like something out of North Africa, while the master bedroom has a French chateau feel to it with its glamorous copper bath and dressing room wrapped into a curved cob wall.

Flashes of glam: the house is luxurious inside as well as being eco-friendly

Glazed sunspaces and an amazing greenhouse brimming with lush tomatoes connect the main house to the smaller annexe, which is currently generating income as a rental home.

"Size-wise, it's a manor house, but its running costs are negligible," says Kevin, proud to have proven that it is possible to "live green" in luxury.

Seven years later, he has built a little cob universe in the West Country, realising his dream thanks to the human energy, stamina, commitment and passion he embodies. It's a cob job well done.

This episode of Grand Designs airs on Wednesday 31 October 2018 at 9pm on Channel 4