In Eure, a craftsman gives his time to save built heritage

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It is a small enclosed space like hundreds of others in Évreux. Weakened by time and humidity, the cob wall of a garden shed threatened to collapse. To try to save it, its owner contacted several craftsmen. The quotes arrived at the same time as his home insurance responded with a refusal of coverage.

Attached to traditional construction techniques, the owner contacted the company A2M again in the hope of obtaining a more advantageous price to renovate her earth wall, where a few concrete blocks and a bag of cement could do the trick. lower cost.

“I didn't have the means, Mathieu offered to come and do the work with me for free,” the Ébroïcienne is still surprised.

By passion for the profession

Trained in Rouen in the old building trades after having passed a CAP in conventional masonry, Mathieu Zouin established his business in Sales in 2023 after having specialized for more than ten years in the restoration of buildings dating from before 1910.

Passionate about his job, he agrees, he says, “once a year” to help an individual on a small renovation project. “The idea is to show that you can preserve an old building and that there is a way to do it at a lower cost by doing it yourself. There is obviously no question of covering a 10 meter wall with scaffolding. »

Deal concluded.

Saturday morning, after having spent the day before to coat the wall in danger with a coat of lime-based primer, Mathieu arrived with his concrete mixer to attack the site.

Earth, sand, lime, straw and water

Once the old cob wall was reinforced with a few small hazel branches to recharge it with raw earth, Mathieu and his “client” set about preparing the material. Thrown into the concrete mixer tank, several buckets of barely sifted clay soil, lime, sand, water and straw were enough to produce a paste sticky enough to adhere to the old walls.

Thrown in bundles by the craftsman and his one-day apprentice, the earth quickly filled the holes. In one morning, the wall was restored to its original state. After a few weeks of air drying, the craftsman will return to cover the shelter and finish the wall. While continuing to advise his client, as he does with Maisons Paysannes de France when he intervenes to raise awareness among residents about the preservation of cob walls. “They bear witness to ancestral know-how. They are found both in rural areas in the heart or on the outskirts of villages, as well as in urban areas.underlined, during training organized in June 2022 in Baux-Sainte-Croix, Maisons Paysannes de l'Eure which, for 45 years, has been working to protect, restore, promote heritage and vernacular construction techniques.

Because “there’s more to life than trade and money”, Mathieu the philanthropist also tries to “send a message” through these small renovation projects. “We are fighting with apprentice training centers to change practices. If, at the end of my career, we manage to open sections dedicated to old buildings, that would be great.”

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