It is not clear to succeed with the lauze

In Cantal, some roofers perpetuate basaltic loess roof construction techniques.

The larger of these slabs a few centimetres thick, bumpy measure up to 4 metres long and weigh hundreds of kilograms. The smaller, only a few tens of centimetres to a few hundred grams... Assembled, they form the rounded scales carapace of old farms and the Wikipedia: as the stones of the walls, these slabs are the basalt or the phonolite sometimes. Called loess, they are "very raw and very hard," explains Jacques Couderc, artisan Roofer since 1993, installed at Collandre, not far from Riom-ès-Montagnes (Cantal). "We're a trade specific to our region, that are found on the job for years." I had the chance to learn it for twelve years of someone who had learned it from a Corrèzien. "What, at the time, was a reference... In effect, without that collective memory has retained the reason, they are the Corréziens who came in Cantal, ask for loess when they replaced the thatch, in the early 20th century. If the stone is local, the know-how was imported... "There is the trick or it did not." "The biggest difficulty is to do something clean, correct and waterproof," continues Jacques Couderc, whose trade has evolved over the past decades: "quarries of the region being over exploited, it is more that loess of recovery." The first task of the roofer is sort the loess: eliminate the damaged there may be up to 30 of loss and then classify the remaining size. The largest are the first rows. Ask for loess is a game of patience: as in a puzzle, each piece moves over the others. "You sometimes spend ten hands before finding one that will." We must be patient, do not count its working time. "Can be two square metres in the day as can be ten", describes the man of art. Given its weight, coverage in loess is based on a "special frame with very thick volliges". A nail into the wood at the level of each of its two "ears" (or notch) fixed the lauze. When it comes to covering a cave, the loess are asked on the Earth. Clay mortar is sometimes used, especially for the rounded parts of bread ovens. Rarity of the raw, sometimes expensive, sold and working time: a roof in loess has almost become a luxury product reserved "for people who have means or which buildings can be subsidized", says Jacques Couderc, making mainly small sites, especially roofs oven bread, municipalities and private individuals. "Since I am installed, I to have repaired more than thirty." I just finished a site which I am proud: the roof of an old furnace into a cottage, with the laying of type Windows Velux. It is not clear to succeed with the lauze. "Today, the lauze is increasingly replaced by slate of Corrèze: raw and not calibrated as loess, same color, they arise on the same principle, but are smaller and lighter. Most importantly, they are still produced in some quarries. This is another specialty of Jacques Couderc which predicts: "cover in loess is lost slowly, or materials." It is not less trained in this profession one of his sons who plans to take its suite.