Cas di torto

Cas di torto (also called cas di lodo or cas di bara) is a traditional building technique from Aruba. It refers to a type of houses made of adobe with rounded corners. These houses were usually found around the plantations.

The technique probably came over from the Venezuelan Paraguaná Peninsula in the 18th century. Until 1925 many houses on Aruba were built using this technique, afterwards it fell into disuse. In 2005 there were 62 cas di torto houses left, of which only 4 were in good condition.

The skeleton of the houses is made up of round wooden poles placed with distances of 1.5 feet between them. Branches are interwoven between them. On this basis, loam is applied, mixed with sand, water and para grass. This is then coated with aloe vera juice, which gives the white colour and helps to protect against the weather.

On top of the poles pieces of wood are fitted that serve as the base for the roofbeams. Until 1815 the roofing usually consisted of maize stems, afterwards the nuclei of columnar cacti were used. The floor is made of loam, mixed with cement or cow dung.

Origin
The name Cas di torto is probably derived from the Spanish name Casas de “Torta”, which brought the settlers from the peninsula Paraguaná in Venezuela to Aruba. Torta in Spanish means cake and refers to the layered clay construction. In the creole language Papiamentu these dwellings were then called Cas di torto, Cas di lodo or Cas di bara.

It was built until 1925 and was out of the urban areas where Cunuku lands – where the plantation workers lived with their large families – are quite common. The oldest cas is in Savaneta.

Today there are about 62 Cas di torto in partly decayed condition. Three of them, in very good restored condition, are located in the Arikok National Park. Further restorations are planned.

These mud houses are remarkably cool inside and perfectly adapted to the climate.

Description

Method of construction
The construction consists mainly of four outer walls, which were anchored from vertical round logs at a distance of about half a meter from each other in the ground and are connected horizontally with a crossbar of bars. On the outer walls, the rafters were made, which were made from the heartwood of the columnar cacti.

Before 1815, the houses had only a roof made of corn straw (Pal’i maishi). After 1815, the roof consisted of thin roundwoods of the columnar cacti running transversely to the rafters, which then, like the outside of the house, were layered with clay and plastered. The roofs and facades were plastered from a mixture of Tonsand, water and small cut Carib grass (Urochloa mutica), also called buffalo grass and used as animal feed. Most recently, the Cas di torto was coated with a water-repellent layer of lime and the juice of aloes several times. This gave the houses an extra weather protection layer and the white appearance. The lime was produced in specially brick lime kilns.

Inner space
The houses were usually divided into a kitchen, a living room, a porch and a bedroom. In the kitchen would be a wooden or metal barrel for storing water that was collected in small rain ponds. Around this barrel a thick loam wall would be erected. Often large families would live in these houses; people would sleep on mats on the floor.

In the Arikok National Park some cas di torto houses can be visited.