José Rostoll keeps alive the age-old trade of barraquero, building traditional barraca cottages and cebera granaries in the Huerta horticultural district just outside Valencia. This involves the use of only a few materials: logs, cane and borrò beachgrass.

In building one of these cottages, the first… thing to consider is its orientation, so as to take advantage of the sunlight and to limit exposure to wind.

Cottage foundations were traditionally built with adobe (fang i pallús), left to dry in the sun. The structure was made of timber. The roof was formed first with reeds (senill) and then woven with borró beachgrass, previously gathered with a corbella sickle. Today adobe has been replaced by brick, and reeds in the roof by fireproof insulating materials. All the rest of the craft (tools, thatching technique, etc.) remains as it was hundreds of years ago.

The tools José uses include moulds, falçó and corbella sickles, rope, and short and long thatcher’s needles.