Glaumbaer Houses

The Icelandic turf houses was the product of a difficult climate, offering superior insulation compared to buildings solely made of wood or stone, and the relative difficulty in obtaining other construction materials in sufficient quantities. Iceland was fully forested when it was settled (save the mountains and highlands), with forests of birch trees. Oak was the preferred timber for building Norse halls in Scandinavia, but native birch had to serve as the primary framing material on the remote island. However, Iceland did have a large amount of turf that was suitable for construction. Some structures in Norway had turf roofs, so the notion of using this as a building material wasn't alien to many settlers. Then in the late 18th century a new style started to gain momentum, the burstabær, with its wooden ends. This is the most commonly depicted version of the Icelandic turf houses and many such survived well into the 20th century. This style was then slowly replaced with the urban building style of wooden house clothed in corrugated iron It is too difficult to erect large structures of turf and sod. Therefore the Icelandic farm was a complex of small, separate buildings. The most used of those were united by a central corridor, but tool and storehouses could only be accessed from outside. The corridor at Glaumbaer is about 21m long and provides access to 9 of the 13 houses of the farm. Two intermediate doors along the corridor in addition to the front door kept cold from penetrating the living quarters.