October10 the big tents

I’ve been wondering what they are . Houses encased in giant jumping castles . There’d be anywhere up to 20 at a time erected in our area . I assumed that it must be asbestos removal . A lot of the houses look as if they’d been built with fibro cement , actually most of them .No I was wrong , its termite control . Termites have the capacity to bring down a large structure , especially when you consider how they build everything in LA.Its not fibro cement ,its timber coated in a trowel on cement . As I’ve said before , there is no brickwork , rarely any weatherboards or any hard structure to the facades of their housing .The entire shape and outer shell is formed with solid chip board style timber , sometimes it can be insulated with a styrofoam type interior. They then apply a plastic waterproof material , staple on mesh and then trowel on the render . Depending on the price , the better the finish . Most seem to go the rough texture ,painted beige . It gets dirty quick and I reckon it looks shit . It’s another reason why painters are everywhere , as they are constantly patching up cracked render and re -painting it.You do see the odd house with a shingle facade that is  the stereotypical Hamptons look , but render is king in LA  . I now understand why pest removal is so big here , structure and facade built in timber is the dominant method of building , leaving them vulnerable to the termite .