Hobbit Houses of the Real World: Welcome to the Shire?

This guy and his father in law built a hobbit house in Wales. They say they built it to be mindful of the environment and to live closer to nature, but obviously they built it in order to live more like hobbits in Lord of the Rings.

The house is nestled into a hillside. Stone and mud (and magic) were the basic construction materials. Water pipes in by gravity feed from a nearby spring. They use a compost toilet–so that’s how hobbits do their business. Their refrigerator is cooled by air coming in from the underground foundations. More pictures: