The training centre
If natural materials are still rarely used, it is mostly because they are little known. Our training centre in Tana (Madagascar) makes them accessible to everyone: architects discover their applications, craftspeople learn how to install them, and eco-building enthusiasts or visiting families can learn the right techniques.
Three formats are available. The full-day workshop covers every aspect of the system being studied. The discovery workshop focuses on a single step, such as making adobes, burning lime, or applying a natural plaster or paint. Finally, you can simply stay at the house: off-grid and designed as a haven of peace, it offers thermal comfort in every season.
Building professionals
We run 2- to 5-day sessions on a range of topics: CEB, ceramics, natural plasters, natural paints, making and installing materials…
À la carte
Come to our training centre whenever you like: discovery workshops run all year round.
Travellers
The centre also welcomes eco-conscious travellers who want to experience a bioclimatic house built entirely from natural and bio-based materials.
Workshops
Earth building & tropical architecture — in Antananarivo
& Concept
CEB
& Firing
& Pigments
Paints
& Uses
& Building
Building system
& Concept
- Tour of the house and workshops
- Discussion on earth building in tropical climates: building porosity, structural solutions
- Choice of materials, natural ventilation, bioclimatic greenhouse, thermal mass, humidity management…
- Why we chose our composite columns
- Masonry workshop: building a composite column (timber + lime joint + CEB)
Compressed
Earth Blocks
- Earth extraction and sieving
- Preparing the mix for pressing
- Using the press
- Theory: binders, Proctor test, CEB bond layout, abrasion, capillarity
- Preparing natural mortar
- Building a CEB wall
Ceramics
the traditional way
- Extracting earth from the rice field
- Preparing the mix before shaping
- Shaping: bricks, terracotta floor tiles, roof tiles…
- Ceramics theory: clay, natural additives, drying, firing
- Laying terracotta tiles on a lime-sand slab or sand bed
- Firing the shaped pieces
Plasters and
natural pigments
- Theory of natural plasters and paints
- Making a lime-sand plaster & an earth plaster
- Making natural pigment: settling clay through a bamboo channel
- Applying plasters to CEB walls
Natural
Paint
- Theory of natural paints
- Making a casein lime paint
- Application on a natural substrate in real conditions
Course wrap-up · Discussion & feedback with the trainers
Lime
& Uses
- Analysis of different limestone rocks
- Burning limestone to turn it into lime
- Grinding and formulating the alternative binder
- Laying a lime slab
- Bedding mortar for CEB
- Lime-sand plaster applied to a brick wall
Fibres
& Building
- Introduction to the fibres found in Madagascar
- Weaving workshop (sisal, raffia)
- Making a timber and raffia door
- Making adobes: earth and fibre bricks
- Thatching a small shelter
Partners
Engineering schools, universities, innovators and architects: Miaina relies on a network of partners in Madagascar and Réunion Island to advance building with earth-based and bio-based materials, from research to the building site.
Tephra
A company specialising in the development and manufacture of bio-based materials. Provides its laboratory to the Miaina training centre.
ESIROI · Réunion Island
Engineering school of Réunion and the Indian Ocean. Partner for research work and hosting engineering students. Several joint projects: earth-air heat exchangers, building a demonstrator, characterisation of natural plasters…
IUT of Saint-Pierre
University Institute of Technology of Réunion Island. Collaboration on materials testing: CEB and natural plasters.
Polytechnic School of Madagascar
Engineering school in Antananarivo. Supports us on soil characterisation and traditional techniques: Tamboho Gasy, rammed earth, hydraulic lime
French Development Agency (AFD)
A long-standing partner of Madagascar, AFD funds sustainable development there (education, agriculture, cities, biodiversity) for the benefit of the most vulnerable populations.
Résiliens
Design consultancy specialising in passive design for architectural and urban projects in tropical climates. Contributes to the Miaina training programme.
Iloko
A partner committed to sustainable housing and the circular economy. Helps manufacture bio-based materials in the Indian Ocean.
Co Archi
Partner architects who worked on the construction of the training centre.
The showroom
Miaina brings together the simplest and most universal materials there are: earth, lime, stone, plant fibres and our natural pigments, in the colours of the Indian Ocean. Plasters, paints, terracotta tile floors, walls of adobe, wattle and daub or compressed earth blocks, rammed earth or tamboho gasy: every technique has been applied with particular care for its aesthetic finish.
We want to share this spirit far beyond our shores. Because hospitality begins with offering a place unlike any other. Hotels, character homes, holiday rentals: our materials give your spaces an authentic, warm and distinctive identity that your guests will find nowhere else.
Tout ce que vous voyez chez Miaina peut vous être livré, où que vous soyez dans le monde. Nous expédions nos enduits, nos peintures et nos matériaux à la palette, en caisson, en groupage ou par container entier, selon l’envergure de votre projet.
Pour la mise en œuvre, nous formons vos équipes dans notre centre de formation situé à Tana. Nous avons également la possibilité d’envoyer un formateur sur votre chantier.
wood
Charred timber
Walls
Natural plasters
Colours
Paints and pigments
Structure
Adobes and CEB
Binders
Lime and low-carbon binders
flooring
Natural floors
Fibres
Fibres and weaving
thermal
Tamboho Gasy
Comfort
Rammed earth
FRAME
The building system
earth
Wattle and daub
Insulation
Bio-based insulation
The house
A true Swiss Army knife, the Miaina house is at once a showroom, a training centre and a place to stay. Just an hour from Tana international airport, it invites you to experience from the inside a bioclimatic house built entirely from bio-based materials. During your stay, you live in a home that regulates its own indoor climate: thermal mass, humidity regulation, insulation with plant fibres. It is full-scale proof that we can build differently, with practical solutions ready for the construction of tomorrow.
The team
Behind Miaina are some ten craftspeople from the valley, each a master of a natural-materials skill. They shape bricks and adobes from rice-field earth, then fire the ceramics. They raise walls of rammed earth and tamboho gasy, the traditional Malagasy rammed-earth technique. They weave the bamboo-strip lattices that carry the wattle and daub. They lay lime floors and apply natural plasters and paints. Others run the permaculture, water management and waste recovery.
Together, they lead the Miaina training workshops. There they pass on these ancestral earth-building techniques, frugal and time-tested, which can inspire builders all over the world.
An earth-building specialist, he designs bioclimatic houses across the Indian Ocean.
In the rice field, he will show you how to make adobes, bricks, terracotta tiles…
Around the house, she will show you how waste management, vegetable gardens and the water cycle all fit together.
Will accompany you during the training sessions.
Your hosts, who will welcome you during your stay at the house
Organises your stay, from the airport shuttle to meals at the house.
Let’s talk about your project
Madagascar · Réunion Island · Mauritius · Mayotte
We support project owners, architects and project leaders across all these territories.
Write to us, call us or fill in the form: we will get back to you quickly.
They lived the Miaina experience
Group training, à la carte workshops or a stay: read our visitors’ reviews and share your own.
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Training centre for bio-based materials, bioclimatic house and R&D laboratory, one hour from Tana.
Antanetibe Ikianja
Madagascar
© 2026 Miaina · All rights reserved
Madagascar · Réunion Island · Mauritius · Mayotte