Drive west out of Taos, past the dizzying drop of the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge, and the horizon starts to look... glitchy. You’ll see these glittering, humpbacked shapes rising out of the sagebrush like buried spaceships or psychedelic hobbit holes. Honestly, it's the kind of place that makes you pull over just to make sure the desert heat isn't finally getting to you.
This is the Greater World Community New Mexico, a 630-acre stretch of high-desert mesa that is technically the largest legal off-grid subdivision on the planet.
Most people come here expecting a hippie commune or a Mad Max film set. What they find instead is a deeply complex, decades-long experiment in "biotecture"—a word coined by the community’s lightning-rod founder, Michael Reynolds. He’s the guy who decided back in the early 70s that garbage was actually the best building material we had. While the world was busy throwing away beer cans and old tires, Reynolds was wiring them together to make "can bricks."
The Reality of Living in a Tire House
You’ve probably heard the pitch: a house that feeds you, heals itself, and costs nothing to run. Sounds like a dream, right? Well, the Greater World Community New Mexico is where that dream hits the hard, rocky reality of the Taos mesa.
These homes, known as Earthships, are built primarily from radial tires packed tight with dirt. We’re talking 300 pounds of rammed earth per tire. It’s back-breaking, brutal work. When you see a finished Earthship, you're looking at thousands of hours of human sweat encased in plaster.
The physics of it is actually pretty cool, though. The thick tire walls act as a thermal mass. Basically, they soak up the sun’s heat during the day and slowly burp it back into the living space at night. In a place like El Prado, where the temperature can swing from a sunny 46°F in the afternoon to a bone-chilling 20°F at night (literally the forecast for today, January 18, 2026), that thermal mass is the only thing keeping you from turning into an icicle without a furnace.
- Materials: 50% of the structure is usually recycled—tires, bottles, cans.
- Water: Every drop of rain or snow that hits the roof is caught, filtered, and used four times.
- Power: 100% solar and wind. No power lines. No "Oops, the grid is down" drama.
Why Greater World Isn't Your Typical Neighborhood
There's no Homeowners Association (HOA) anymore, which is a bit of a wild-west situation. Back in 2019, the original Land User Association documents expired. Now, the 90 or so homes in the Greater World Community New Mexico operate as a collection of independent islands. You own your 1 to 3-acre lot "fee simple," but you're bound by a Land User’s Code that basically says: "Don't mess with the environment, and keep it Earthship."
Walking around, you notice the silence first. There’s no hum of power lines. No distant roar of city traffic. Just the wind coming off the Sangre de Cristo Mountains.
But it's not all rainbows and indoor banana trees. Living here means being your own utility company. If your solar inverter pops at 2 AM, you aren't calling the electric company. You’re grabbing a headlamp and a multimeter. If the cistern is low because it hasn't rained in three months, you’re suddenly very aware of how long your showers are. It's a lifestyle that demands you pay attention to the planet in a way most of us haven't since we were kids playing in the dirt.
The Misconceptions About Cost
Here is the big one: people think Earthships are cheap because they’re made of "trash."
Kinda, but not really.
If you build it yourself with a crew of friends and ten years of your life, sure, you can save a buck. But if you hire Earthship Biotecture to build one for you in 2026? You’re looking at roughly $225 per square foot. That famous "Phoenix" Earthship you see in all the magazines? It cost over $1.5 million to bring to life. These aren't just shacks; they’re high-end custom homes with integrated botanical cells and sophisticated greywater filtration systems.
The Legal Battle for the Right to Be Weird
The Greater World Community New Mexico exists because Michael Reynolds fought the law, and—eventually—the law gave him a permit.
In the 90s, Taos County officials were not exactly thrilled about a guy building "unconventional" subdivisions out of tires. They shut him down for years. He actually lost his architecture license for a while. It took the "Sustainable Development Testing Sites Act" to pave the way for this community to exist legally. It’s a specific piece of New Mexico legislation that allows for experimental housing prototypes to bypass some of the rigid building codes that make off-grid living so difficult elsewhere.
🔗 Read more: Hot Dog Flavored Chips: Why Your Taste Buds Are So Confused
What to Do If You're Just Passing Through
You don't have to move in to see what the fuss is about. The Visitor Center is open seven days a week. For about $9, you can do a self-guided walk through a functional Earthship.
If you really want the "test drive" experience, you can rent one for a night. Places like the "Waybee" or the "Phoenix" are on Airbnb and the Earthship website. You’ll get to see the indoor waterfalls and the "botanical cells" (basically giant indoor planters) that filter your shower water to flush your toilet. It’s a weirdly satisfying loop.
One thing most visitors miss: look at the walls closely. You’ll see "bottle bricks"—glass bottles cut and taped together, then plastered into the wall. When the sun hits them, the whole room glows like a cathedral made of Heineken and Topo Chico bottles. It’s surprisingly sophisticated for a house made of stuff from a landfill.
Actionable Steps for the Curious
If the idea of the Greater World Community New Mexico has you thinking about your own escape from the grid, start here:
- Visit the Visitor Center: Don't just look from the road. Go inside. Feel the temperature difference. The air in an Earthship feels different—it's humid and oxygen-rich because of the plants.
- Rent for a Night: Experience a 20-degree temperature swing without a heater. It’ll either sell you on the concept or make you appreciate your HVAC system forever.
- Check the Academy: If you're serious about building, the Earthship Academy in Taos offers month-long intensives. You'll learn the six principles of biotecture and probably spend a week pounding dirt into tires.
- Research the Land User’s Code: If you’re looking to buy a lot, understand that you’re joining a community with specific ecological goals. It’s not just about the house; it’s about the 347-acre "green belt" that stays wild forever.
The Greater World Community New Mexico isn't a perfect utopia. It’s dusty, the legal history is messy, and the houses require a lot of "operator" input. But in a world where the grid feels increasingly fragile, there's something deeply comforting about a house that just... works, even when everything else stops.