so it'll be a grey roof then

The only slight concern that we had with the last set of plans from Eric was that there are now 2 solar panels prominently displayed on the roof.

I was a little worried they might be an eyesore, so asked what flexibility there was to move and/or disguise.

Here's Eric's response:

For solar panels to work properly in this situations a few few criteria need to be addressed:
- North facing, minimal shading
- Nearby, and below the hot water tank (which is also positioned to suit the wood cooker)
- The pipe from the tank to the panel needs to go down continuously with no dips or uphill section.

I think that this is a good position for the system to work. Another option is on the east verandah roof, but it will be shaded by early afternoon. It can even go at ground level, but there is always a chance that the panels will be broken. One option to hide the panels is to have a grey roof which I often do.


So, it'll be a grey roof then. :-)

detailed plans for new house (almost)

Today the almost-finished house plans arrived from Eric. I say almost, as there's still a chance they might need tweaking depending on the structural engineers report. (Which as yet we've not commissioned, as holding off to hear about the planning permit and also to get some alternative quotes).

These plans are designed to be of sufficient detail to be suitable for applying for a building permit. As much as he could, Eric has kept descriptions generic, to allow us flexibility in deciding on the precise brand / style of finish.

The best thing about this set of the plans is that it's got detailed measurements, so we can at last seriously cracking on working out things like the design of the kitchen.

I've uploaded a couple of the pages to Flickr as below, but if you're curious, the full set of plans (all 17 pages worth) is here.

Ground floor - main house:


Second floor - main house:



Library wing:

Hot water system

We had to decide on the hot water system type for the new house, so Eric could factor it into the plans. He laid out two basic options, of which we decided to go with Option 1 - not least because we don't have mains gas connection:

Option 1:
"One that I have used successfully in projects like yours is a hybrid of solar, wood fire and electric with a tank concealed in the roof space. The electric element rarely gets used. We used this arrangement at our old bush block where we didn't have mains electricity, so the electric element was never connected. The system works well in summer (solar) and winter (wood fire). There are occasional warm overcast days (about ten per year, from my experience) when the fire is not on and the and clouds prevent solar heating. The seperate concealed tanks don't seem to come with gas boosters, only electric. You need a plumber who is familiar with these systems to make sure it works properly"

Option 2:
"A common arrangement these days is a solar 'pre-heater' with an LPG instant gas heater. The system comprises of a tank and solar panels mounted on the roof. Water circulates through the panels heating the water in the tank when there is sunshine. From the tank, the water passes through a 'instant' LPG heater before going to the tap. If the water is already hot (summer) the LPG heater doesn't come on. If the water is cool or just warm, the LPG heater goes on enough to top it up. These systems are very common and most plumbers could fit them"

the house model has landed

So I gave you a sneak preview of this a while back, but this week the real thing arrived!

It's had pride of place on the kitchen table but finally this weekend I got round to taking photos. Here's a montage of them complete with cheesy music. Enjoy! :-)

Our house in miniature

Ta da... The first sighting of the model for the new house which is currently winging its way across the oceans to us.



I'll take more photos from every angle when it arrives but couldn't resist sharing this sneak preview.

I love it. :-)

latest floorplans for the new house

It's floorplans galore at the moment. Hot on the heels of *finally* getting the finished plans for the cottage, after nearly a year's hiatus we now have revised plans for the dream house being built next door.

Here's roughly how it all fits together, with the cottage and dream house - along hopefully with a shed for Dave - helping to create an almost fully enclosed "secret garden" area. We're doing up the cottage first to live in before starting on the dream house:




Now focusing on the dream house...

Here's the ground floor:



The Study will double as a Dining Room for big occasions like Christmas.

The Study/Reading room wing is now bigger and more clearly separated into rooms. We did this partly to get extra wall space for bookshelves, and partly to make it easier to convert to a bedroom, if God forbid we ever had to sell or found ourselves incapacitated and unable to sleep upstairs. I'm still not 100% certain on the placement of the doorway between the study and reading room though.


Here's the second floor:



The dressing room is much bigger - it's now a proper room rather than a large walk in closet. It's also had the positive side effect of making the bathroom bigger too. :-)

In case you're wondering why only one bathroom and not ensuites... This was a deliberate choice. Should we ever have to sell, the configuration is such it would be easy to add/convert to ensuites. But, for us we didn't see the point in sacrificing space to multiple bathrooms that we'd never use.

The other major change is the addition of the front upstairs terrace that Pete suggested, accessible by climbing out the window. I want to make the windows with big sills so you can prop a cushion on them and sit half in the room, half out.

And of course, the upstairs storey of the reading room.


Finally, here's the various profile views:

North: looking down the hill towards the dam and orchard:



West: this is the view you'll see as you get to the end of the driveway, thus arguably this could be considered the "front". I love the way the profile looks now with the tower in.



South: this is the view from standing midway in the 'secret garden'. It's not complete because it doesn't have the tower shown, but you can imagine the shape. I love how the bath will be in the upstairs bay overlooking this.



East: there are two versions of this, first what you'd see from the outside:



and second, a kind of cross section view of it:

redesigned library

Woohoo! Eric's sent through the first part of the redesign, and we love it.

From his email on November 7th:

I've been working through that list of modifications. Widening the hall and pantry was more difficult than I had imagined, but I have it working. It sounds simple, but I have designed the house to work on a simple structural module. That will help down the track with some of the details. Here are some sketches of the library tower and how it could work with some future bed rooms where the billiard table will go.

Here's the side view:



Here's the floorplan views:



Hopefully we'll never have to convert it to bedrooms, but so pleased we have the option. We could either put it to two small bedrooms as this shows, and convert part of the laundry to be a shared bathroom for them, or else put in just one lovely downstairs bedroom with ensuite.



Finally, this shows the first floor and rooftop balcony for the library tower. Not much to say about this except that we love it. I know it's utterly whimsical and we'll probably use the tower balcony once in a blue moon, but it will be such fun to have and give a great looking over the houses and garden.

kickstart

The house design alterations have been on the backburner for months, as Eric had a bunch of other projects he needed to work on plus he moved house to Ballarat. We didn't mind as we're not in any rush, but it is a nice feeling to have finally got back to working on it. (For a reminder of where we left off, see here)

Eric kickstarted the process again with an email on September 11th:
"Well, I finally started going through the plans again today. I have notes from our conversations from the last little while. I thought that since it has been so long (my fault) it would be prudent to mark up what I believe to be the areas to look at. These mark ups aren't necessarily the solution, but rather the general ideas. Can you have a look and tell me if it reflects the areas to look at?"

Ground floor:


Top floor:


Side views:




We replied a few days later:

"Thanks a lot for this. I just looked through the plans with Dave and what you have tallies with our recollections too.

We have just a couple of general thoughts re: the library tower... I really like the idea of having the bigger library. And Dave is thrilled about the idea of having his tower. :-)

Our only slight hesitation is in terms of what it potentially does to the house value, were we ever to have to sell it. Before, we could arguably pretend the library was another bedroom. Now it will be less easy... I'm wondering whether there's a way of having our cake and eating it too - ie: having a library extension but by playing with where the stairs are & shape of upstairs floor, making it so that the library billiards area + extension could be easily converted to ideally 2 other bedrooms if ever needed in future?

Also, Dave is curious to explore some other roof designs for the tower, eg: a squarer roof rather than triangular. He still wants it to be pointy though - ie: he's not thinking of it being a flat roof (even though perhaps it could be cool as a kind of mini lookout thingy)"

tweaks to new house plans

We're almost finished now on the plans for the new house. We're just awaiting a few sketches of particular areas, and then it's time to build the model. Yay!

Just so this blog is a complete record of the process, below are extracts from recent emails with Eric.


EMAIL FROM ME TO ERIC, NOVEMBER 8TH
... WITH ERIC'S REPLIES INSERTED IN ITALICS...

You'll be pleased to know that we still love the ideas we discussed. There are just three things...

1) after a little more thought I have a slight trepidation about the library 'tower' feeling a bit too formal, cold, arcane, which I think it might if the only things in the upper level of the tower are bookshelves. But, I think that could easily be offset, provided that on one side this is a little area for seating. For example, perhaps we could have a little walk in alcove on one side, which could have seats and a small desk, etc. It doesn't have to be big, but I think it'd make all the difference in feeling in the upstairs space so that it didn't feel like somewhere you just went to get a book and then came straight back down. I'd suggest probably the side that looks into the secret garden area would be best for this, as guessing that will also have a sliver of distance view between the houses(?). I know this would mean we'd lose part of the book storage area, but that's OK, I think there'll still be plenty. What do you think?

ERIC'S REPLY:
I have imagined a little seat interrupting the bookshelves at some point in the upper bookshelf area. I's always nice to have a place to pause and sit with a book. The balcony should be quite open to the library area below. Perhaps once we have some sketches, it will be easier to visualize.


2) the roof of the laundry area... I forgot to mention this when we met, but to my eye it seems to slope oddly in comparison to the other areas. Was there a structural reason for this? Is it possible to alter so it echoes the other rooflines more?

ERIC'S REPLY:
That is true. I have gone back and forth on that roof. Here is the issue. Look at the west elevation. The gable is a 45 degree pitch to match the main house roof. See how it sticks up higher than the main roof over the laundry? On the south elevation, I have shown the ridge of the laundry roof return back into the main to at an angle so that it doesn't show in the courtyard. I did look at other options lie a shallower pitch on the gable over the laundry, but I like the way that the steeper gable re;ates to the main roof, and marks the main entry of the house. We can look at this more closely in the study model.


3) the bay window in the lounge - and I guess related, the shape of the balcony on the upstairs bedroom. I know we've discussed this over and over about whether to keep it with the circular feel or whether to make it more a square bay. And I know we settled at leaving it circular, for reasons I can't recall, which is why I didn't raise it when we met. But every time I look at the house plans, it just niggles at me still, and so I just thought I would flag with you that if you wanted to alter the shape, so that it was a rectangular bay rather than semicircle, to thus echo the boxier shapes of the dormers, the square library tower, the square stairs, etc, I would be very happy with you doing that.

ERIC'S REPLY
The circular bay window originated in an idea about making the two sides slight different from each other. A square bay window would achieve that as well. I can look at it on the next version of the plans. If we don't like the square version, we can always go back.

Day three - new house plans

The bulk of our third day here, from 11am on, was spent with our architect Eric in Daylesford (about an hour or so away). Here's a photo of him with Dave:



Broadly the house layout is staying the same but we're enlarging it... incrementally the extra cost won't be that much and we'd rather err on the side of too much space (as we'll easily fill it) than risk it feeling cramped.

The biggest changes:

• The library will become MUCH bigger. We're extending it in length by about 4m but putting a small wall jutting out a little to give it the feel of two separate spaces, yet open enough to see through. The furthest space will be two storey, with spiral stairs up to a landing, so that we have some serious book storage both above and below. We'll be using the giant stained glass lampshape in here as a kind of reverse cupola, with lights & skylight above.
  
  
• The dressing room upstairs will have a dormer window inserted to make it feel more spacious and add room for a seat... it'll also be a little wider, so it feels less like a walk in closet. There'll be a matching dormer on the other side.
  
  
• We're changing the shape of the stairs to be square rather than a rounded finish, with a decent landing area, which may entail extending it a little to ensure they retain a sweeping feel, akin to the stairs at Standen. We'll be moving the 11ft clock so that it backs onto the kitchen wall rather than between the stairs, and raising the ceiling height by a step or two, to ensure there's space for it.
  

Other less major changes:

• We're widening the entrance hall and similarly enlarging the pantry and kitchen.
  
  
• The kitchen door will be shunted towards the front of the house to make space for glass fronted full-length cupboards for storing china, on the wall backing onto the pantry. This solves one of the major storage dilemmas.
  
  
• The bedroom and study upstairs (and possibly also the bathroom, yet tbd) will have 1-2 steps down to enter them from the hall landing. The exact amount depends on how much the ceiling in the stairway area needs to be raised to accommodate the clock. This will give them a wonderful feeling I think, like the house we saw in Washington.
  

• Eric is going to attempt to bring the bathroom dormer window forward a little, so it has a bit more space, although it'll still be cosy in feel.
  

• At the front Eric is going to see if its possible to put a small balcony - accessed via climbing over the window sill - across the top of the front verandah. It depends on what it does to the roof shape, but he's going to experiment with it.
  

• In the lounge room, a false ceiling will be added starting a bit in front of the bay window area, to make the space feel more interesting... and at the same time the whole room will be lengthened a bit "letting it breath" in Eric's words. A similar thing will be done in the kitchen probably too.
  

Eric is going to work on revising the drawings and send them to us in a few weeks, so I'll scan and add them here when they arrive.

3D model of bedroom

Yay! Sketchup is actually easier to use than I'd expected. Yesterday I managed to create a 3D model of the bedroom & dressing room area for Amherst. Below are a few screenshots and you can see more here:







I'm so glad I did it because the roof shape from inside looks nothing like what I'd expected from seeing the 2D drawings. I'd been thinking that the bedroom would feel cavernous and the angles would be too sharp, but seeing it now I really really like it.

The only thing I don't like in this section is the dressing room, because it feels more like a walk-in closet rather than a room. It's also too small. I've already altered it slightly, by taking off the lowered ceiling that Eric had drawn in which helps a little but it's still not ideal.

latest design iteration for new house

We got an email from Eric forewarning us of their arrival, and they were waiting for us when we got back. Tonight I'm going to try and look through them properly, but thought I'd begin by getting them scanned in and posted here.

First, here's Eric's comments on what he did in this iteration:

"I ended up having a blissful solid week with almost no
distractions, so I made a lot of progress with the designs.
I've done all the main drawings like floor plans, ceiling
plans, cross sections and elevations on AutoCAD, so they are
all very accurate. I worked up all of the drawing together
so that details like ceiling height and window placements
all correspond very well. I have also shown things like the
sideboard, the grandfather clock, and the big lantern, so
there should be enough detail to have useful discussions.

I have made small adjustments to quite a few little things to make
them work better (in my opinion...)

Some aspects like what happens around the fireplaces (and TV?) will
need some more thought. I played around with kitchen, and had an idea
about the main table going against the north windows. I'll look
forward to your thoughts.

And now, here's the plans, starting with the elevation views, to which there's been little change:










Now here's the ground floor room layout, along with a plan showing Eric's proposed ceiling heights in each area:






Here's the same for the second floor:






And finally, here are two cross-sections of the building which give a better feeling for how the rooms might feel:

thoughts on staircase

We're about to get new drawings from Eric. One of the main things he's been working on in this iteration (besides the mudroom saga!) is the staircase.


Email from Eric (March 31)

I just had a good couple of days working on detailed drawings. It was fun to get back into it. One of the main things I've been working on is the staircase. It's a pretty major design feature, and I needed to get it to work with building codes as well as be an appealing place to walk up and down. Anyway, I'll have some drawings ready to send to you early next week.


My reply (March 31)

In case it helps any, some specific thoughts on the staircase (sorry if have mentioned them already, I have lost track!) are:

- Idea of the bottom few steps being suitable for sitting on, ie: doubling as seats as well as steps. As per pattern language: "Flare out the bottom of the stair with open windows or balustrades and with wide steps so that the people coming down the stair become part of the action in the room while they are on the stair, and so that people below will naturally use the stair for seats"

- Idea of there being a landing area midway up, as a place you could pause, look down on the action, perhaps a chair in corner, low bookshelves, etc. ie: the landing area would be wider than the stairs.

- I have a vision of the stairs being wide enough for 2 people to walk up side by side without it being cramped. Like the nice stairs you find in old manors (but not ridiculously oversized like in palaces).

- would love love love to use the old oak wooden bannister railings and scrolled ends here(not necessarily the iron/copper bits though)

revisiting the mudroom

Back in February, Eric came up with yet another alternative for the mudroom shape to address my previous concerns. It took me until the end of March to comment on it properly! Here's a catchup on the email discussion:


Email from Eric (Feb 15)

Here's another idea for the mud room. It involves going ahead and letting it project out as sort of a bay window next to the main entry. If we liked the idea in principle, the actual shape could be refined and developed. What do you think?






My comments (Mar 29)

Overall I really like the concept, and it's a hell of a lot better than
messing with the pantry position etc. (although at some stage I still want to get a better feel for the kitchen layout, but that's separate). In no particular order, these are my comments:

I don't like how the mudroom isn't symmetrical anymore, it has the corner cut off one side. I would rather make it a square wall without the diagonal bit.

Where you have marked as Coats in the new bit, I'd like instead to call it a cupboard... like you had in the original version way back when. Maybe it will be for coats, but more likely will end up being for all that cleaning stuff - shoe polish, brooms, blah blah blah that feels like it should belong in / near the mudroom. Maybe there will be space in the waist height units in mudroom proper but who knows. I'm envisaging instead that there will be hooks for coats in the entrance hall bit along the mudroom wall, and we could also have hooks on the wall in mudroom for messier things, behind the door.

I liked the stairs a lot in your first version coming up onto the verandah with matching curved handrails on either side. I don't like there being handrail only on one side and that it is curved if the other side is straight... Ideally I'd like to be able to have both sides curved, but that's not possible unless it moves over so it's not opposite the door (which would I think feel odd) OR perhaps the verandah base could extend out further? So that it comes out to be level with how far the new bay bit juts out? Now, I know that might mess up the amount of sunlight going in on that side? If so, perhaps could have the base of the verandah jutting out but the roof staying back? We could for instance then use the bit that isn't undercover as being for plants in pots... (cacti etc?) Not sure how it would look but it's an idea to throw out there.

Now, onto the Projection view...

One of the things I liked most in the first version was how you had the sequence of 5 small square windows on this side... I would like to get back to that. Perhaps we could just have one square window in the middle of the mudroom bay of the same shape as the others to get it back? We could still have windows on either side of the bay to let more light in but without spoiling the symmetry?

I really like the way you have moved the triangular bit (gable?) on the roof over to be above the bay area rather than above the entrance door. I like this better than the way it was originally even because it is more symmetrical. I also like how it is shingles (I loved the sunburst motif thing too but we still have that about the breakfast area side, so happy to have something different).

a wacky rethink of downstairs

We are struggling to get the placement of the downstairs bathroom right.

It started out opening off the central hall, but that was too prominent and we didn't want it opening directly from a place that would be doubling as a dining room. Dave also suggested it should be near a side of the house so it's easy to access from the garden.

So then it moved to take up some of the space in the mudroom. Except that there isn't enough space there so every iteration we've tried so far just makes it feel awfully cramped.

An idea just occurred to me, sparked by discussing the Pattern Language insights with Dave, which might help - except it requires rather greater rearrangement of the downstairs.

What if we put the mudroom back the way it was to begin with, that we all loved.

What if we made the stair landing, midway up, wider ... space for an armchair in the corner, some books, if you ever had a party with musicians you could even stick them up there like an mini stage! OK, I'm getting carried away, but if the landing had a larger floor area it'd give us much more flexibility.

Then, what if we moved the pantry, so that instead of it being on the side of the kitchen facing the secret garden, it was behind the front porch in the room 'under the stairs'... which is now much more spacious than a hallway sized cupboard because the landing is wider. We'd still have our "living hall" downstairs, it's just not quite so ginormous...but still plenty enough space for Xmas trees and dinner parties.

(We'd have to move the chimney I guess? And if so, the upstairs bedroom would need tweaking because of the new chimney location, but other than that hopefully it wouldn't mess up the structural stuff too much).

Then, that gives us space at the back of the house that was formerly the pantry to play with and squeeze the bathroom. I don't know what this looks like exactly, but maybe something like this:



Although not exactly this, because Dave doesn't like it. He likes the new position of the pantry, but he doesn't like something to do with the verandah and sunroom. I can't work out what exactly though. Something about not being able to walk to the breakfast area to the sunroom, except that you can - although maybe it's because he wants it to be under a verandah? I'm not sure. If that's the case then all we have to do is extend the sunroom & breakfast room verandah areas out a bit more and voila the undercover walkway is back again. But I suggested that and he just frowned. So I don't know *sigh*

It's an idea anyway.

new mudroom layout (still WIP)

A few days ago we got an email from Eric, with a sketch of a new idea for the mudroom incorporating the downstairs loo:



This works better than the previous one because the loo area feels more self-contained. But unfortunately it still doesn't feel right.

I know we'll be using this loo a lot, and that visitors will too. I don't want the toilet area itself to feel like a cubicle in a corridor, not so cramped. I also know that the mudroom will become a dumping ground for 'mess' from Dave and for all that stuff that you have to put away but just can't face doing at that moment. This means the mudroom will live up to its messy name a lot of the time... but I don't want the mess visible every time you go to the loo! The sliding door will help but it also has the effect of making it feel very enclosed, and so I know most of the time we'll end up leaving the door open.

I'm wondering whether the solution is just to bite the bullet and accept that we need a bigger space in this wing. What if we moved over the 'secret garden' verandah by the width of the passage? Or, What if we stretched out that entire side of the house, getting extra space in the lounge as well as the library wing? Perhaps then we could even keep the same floor area in the library by nudging the boundary of the mudroom wall back a bit, thus getting us even more space for the mudroom/bathroom bit? That way maybe we could get that glorious cupboard back with space for all the cleaning junk, and get back to the lovely feel that it had before we started trying to squeeze in the loo.

I feel I'm being awfully fussy but I don't want to forever kick myself when I live there for not fixing it.

some more ideas from our architect

Yesterday we got an email from Eric commenting on our recent blog post about the floorplan. Here's what he said, with our initial reactions:

"I've gone through your blog. Everything you say sounds fine. I've had a couple of ideas for the upstairs bath and the mud room.

One issue with the bath is to make sure that room is still a nice balanced shape. I've put together a little idea which I have attached. The main bath and chair area would be 2.6 x 3.1m with the basin and shower sitting outside of that".



We really really like this. We measured out the size of the main bathroom area (ie: without the shower, sink) and it is pretty big, about two thirds the size of our conservatory here. It seems big enough to feel spacious but not so large that if feels cavernous. I especially like the idea of having the changing ceiling levels.


"With the mud room, I'm concerned that lots of the storage (and usefulness) would be lost. The idea that I sketched up addresses some of that. It includes the WC but keeps the bench space and even adds some shelves for shoes, bags etc. We mainly lose floor space which is mainly an issue if you have a few people in there at once".



Dave really likes this but for some reason that I can't yet pinpoint, I feel uncomfortable with it. I don't know if it's because the basin is in the open, because of the sliding door, or because there seem acres of bench space - maybe I'd feel better if some was replaced with a giant cupboard? I agree though it's an improvement on our previous idea, it's just that unlike the bathroom it doesn't yet feel right to me "gut feel". I need to sleep on it, that usually helps clarify things!


The ideas around the kitchen all sound fine. Deleting the WC can allow the kitchen pantry to increase. I'd be tempted to leave the wall where the WC door was blank for a nice piece of furniture rather than a built in bar. Perhaps the bar could be in the furniture? It would be a good place for furniture as it id directly opposite the the entry. Indeed, the kitchen is quite large. I'd love to spend some time seeing what more we could do with it -- like seats, desks etc.

I like the idea of leaving the hall wall blank... and perhaps this could be a good place for our prized sideboard? That would be well suited to double as a bar, if Dave wants (albeit he'd have to be very careful not to leave ringmarks!)

It will be great to think more about the kitchen layout specifically. I think our fears about it being so large are partly just because we can't properly envision it yet. I'd like to do the same for the entrance hall area too, at least the bit that is under the stairs.


"The balcony upstairs would definitely be fun. It might create some difficulties with the roof. It's worth looking into, though, and see what it would look like.

If you are anything like us, you'll use you outdoor BBQ a lot. At this time of year, we cook outside about five nights a week. By winter, we're all dying for baked food, but it's amazing what you can do on a BBQ. It's fine to delete the sink from the screened area and concentrate on the verandah.

The next step for me is really to draw it up more accurately (probably on CAD) and also do some larger scale detailed sketches of the areas like the bath, mud room, kitchen etc. Once I've done all that, I'll build a model to see what it really looks like. (It might sound odd putting it on CAD before the study model, but computer drawings are so easy to change, I like to start using them in the design stage.)"

Yippee, models! I'm looking forward to one day being able to "fly through" a mockup of the house like you see on those TV shows.

Feedback on new house plans (at last)

We got the most recent iteration of the plans for the new house from Eric back in August. Then life intervened and it hasn't been until yesterday that we had time (and the right frame of mind) to properly dissect them and discuss. Here, at last, are our thoughts on the final round of tweaks we want to make before progressing to the next stage of design.

Let's start with the ground floor.

Just to recap, this is what the plan from Eric looked like (click to make it larger):


Overall we really like it, so rather than enumerate all the things we like, I'm just going to list the things we want to alter, room-by-room. To minimise the extent of the changes (so as not to affect the outside shape) we've tried wherever possible to keep within the existing dimensions. This house is already bigger in terms of floorspace than we'd first envisaged, so we didn't want to make it worse!


Entry hallway

We'd like to have a place to sit to take off dirty shoes, coats, etc. One idea to achieve this is to 'steal' some space from the lounge area, so there's a seating alcove on one side of the table in the hallway - ie:


This would give us a place to sit and help imbue an arts & crafts feel. I'd envisage the seat being a simple bench with a liftup lid for storing things, with a hat rack and shelves above. On the opposite wall I'd envisage there being coat racks.


Utility and Mudroom

We've always wanted to have a toilet downstairs so you don't have to go upstairs all the time. In Eric's plan, this was positioned off the central hall area, but we didn't like that for two reasons. First, it felt like it would be uncomfortable having the toilet so close by if we were using the central hall area for parties. Second, Dave was worried that it wasn't close enough to the outside, so he'd traipse mud through all the time. Which is a very good point, as that would drive me nuts!

So, we decided to move the toilet to the Utility and Mudroom area. This solves the problems, albeit sacrificing a sense of formality. It is also very practical in that part of our justification of having the "Library" wing is that we could convert it to a third bedroom if ever needed. If this happened, we'd want to put an ensuite in part of the mudroom area; so by putting a toilet and basin in we're already partway there.

We experimented with many alternatives for making this change. We wanted for the toilet and basin to be enclosed but not stupidly cramped. We also wanted the mudroom to still be a nice shape. This was the best layout we came up with:


We could perhaps put a window in the wall above the WC sink looking onto the hallway. It could be obscured glass, or the type that's mirrored on one side and see-through from the other? Or, perhaps one of the stained glass panels? Either way, it would help make it feel less enclosed and let in some natural light.

The washing machine and dryer (on a shelf above) sit in the alcove between the outside wall and the back of the toilet. The laundry trough and bench tuck into the wall near the verandah door. There's still a nice big cupboard on the other side of the door for all my hobby and cleaning things. So, overall, the mudroom still has all the key things I wanted albeit a little more squeezed.

If ever we wanted to convert to an ensuite, we'd simply build a wall across from the verandah door to the toilet door. A shower could be put in the space where the cupboard is currently and voila, an ensuite. Hopefully we'll never need to do this but it's a useful option to have.


Lounge

There's not much to say about the lounge. At one point we thought about changing the bay window to be more rectangular, but on experimenting we realised the curved layout looked a lot nicer. So, the only change we have to the lounge is to steal some space to allow for the alcove in the entrance hallway, as described above.


Central hallway

The only definite change we want to make is to remove the toilet and add an alcove for a bar. (See kitchen section for more details).

Overall, we like this space but are having trouble envisaging it. I'm guessing there will be space for big storage cupboards under the stairs (suitcases, Xmas decorations, etc), a bench perhaps, a grandfather clock in the centre, and so on, but I can't fully picture it in my mind. But, we're very happy with the concept of this space. It'll be wonderful for parties and entertaining, and even for everyday it'll be handy for working on hobbies where you need to spread out and want to leave it in situ for a few days, without it being in the way.

UPDATE: We'd also like to ensure there's a place for this sideboard somewhere in this central hallway. Perhaps it can go against the wall underneath the stairs?


Kitchen

Initially we loved the kitchen. But then, on reflection, we started to imagine what it might feel like to have to go into the pantry every time you wanted to open the fridge! Plus, it felt so big...

We've got some ideas to solve it though. First and foremost, the fridge. We want it to be fairly central and - now that we've decided to go with mains power as a backup - we'd like to have one of those large American style double door fridges (or at least plan in for the option!). We've found space for it in what was previously the downstairs WC. This also has the advantage of giving us a bit extra storage in the pantry, plus a roomy cupboard off the central hall which we could use as a built-in bar:


We've also toyed with the idea of adding in some kind of island bench or butchers block on a trolley, perhaps even with a built in tub for washing vegetables (can easily empty the water into a bucket and toss onto the garden). This could live at the end of the table, perhaps, and be wheeled around as needed. Overall, we want to make the kitchen work areas feel a little smaller and closer together.

We also had the thought of making a kind of breakfast bar area, with two stools tucked under the bench, looking over the front window. I'm envisaging that the cupboards in this stretch could have glass doors, so it can act as a display area, and also to differentiate it from the "working" part of the kitchen. This could be where we store dinner sets and nice pots, etc - ie: things that you don't use everyday but that you'd use a lot more often if you had them easily to hand! Perhaps the corner could also function as a kind of kitchen "desk" area, like so many design books seem to recommend.


Screened porch

For everyday, we're more likely to have this set up as a kind of conservatory / informal lounge area than as a dining room, but that's just furniture. The only thing we want to change, as shown in the picture above, is to get rid of the cooking area. For outside cooking we'll use the BBQ so there's no need for this anymore. I can imagine myself filling this room with plants, to give it a feel of a real garden room.


Now moving on to the first floor. This is what it looks like overall in the plans at the moment (click to make it bigger):



Master bedroom

Overall we really like it so it's mostly just tweaks rather than anything major.

In terms of the balcony, at one point we wanted to make it more rectangular than curved. But now that we're keeping the curved bay downstairs we think it'd be better to leave it alone. We're not sure how big the balcony is. If it isn't already, we'd like it to have enough room for a few potplants, perhaps even a small chair (although the latter isn't that important).

We also thought it might be nice to add in another balcony area, a kind of narrow walkway above the middle verandah:


There are already windows on both sides - one in the bedroom, one in the study. We would suggest leaving it as a window in the bedroom, but perhaps making the one in the study a glass door, or a sash window that slides open enough that you can easily climb through. Among other things, this balcony could have the telescope and serve as a kind of "tower room" in spirit. We'd like it to be wide enough to have a small chair - I'm envisaging it being about the width of a footpath.


Study

Overall, we really like the way the room is shaped. It's got a nice feel, and would be fairly easy to split into two smaller bedrooms if it was ever needed. At the moment it's called a reading room but now we have the library this doesn't make sense, so we'd like to re-christen it as the Study. To reflect this, in the drawings we'd like to replace the double bed with a large desk, and perhaps also add some cupboards instead of only bookshelves (as we'll need somewhere to hide away all the computer stuff). Of course, it'll also still double as a guest bedroom, but we'll achieve that via having a sofa bed rather than a dedicated sleeping area.


Bathroom

Last of all, the upstairs bathroom. This is one of the most important rooms and the one we want to alter the most. There are two key things that are wrong about the current plan - the toilet needs to be in a separate room (I hate having it all in one), and there isn't space for an armchair. It sounds crazy I know but I've always wanted one... a comfy place to sit while chatting to whoever's in the bath, and also a place to put things, to sit while you're doing your hair, whatever. We struggled with this but finally came up with a layout that seemed to work, without taking up any more space:


The shower area has now moved to a smaller corner, and in practice would be open as a kind of wetroom rather than an enclosed cubicle. I'm envisaging that we might have glass bricks, or perhaps even some of the stained glass, as the partition between the shower and the toilet, so that light can still get into the WC area. Alternatively, perhaps there could be a skylight in the WC. There's a nice big basin with plenty of bench space beside it and a big mirror in the space where the toilet used to be. Importantly too, the symmetry of the upstairs landing is maintained, with the doors to the WC and the bathroom mirroring each other (and deliberately opening outwards to maximise the space in the rooms).

UPDATE: we now have another idea for the bathroom, inspired by Mum's comment, which I think I like better.


This layout has the advantage of a more spacious WC with it's own outside window and still gives us a nice shaped bathroom. The dotted line would be a solid wall but maybe made of glass bricks or (even better) stained glass panels?

The only downsides are small - we sacrifice part of the bedroom walk-in closet (but it's still pretty big) and have less bench space around the sink. As before, I'd envisage the shower area as being a wetroom alcove rather than a cubicle.

Note also the addition of two extra little windows - one in the WC, and then a matching one over the sink to make it appear symmetrical from the outside. I think provided we made these a different shape to the other windows (eg: diamond, circular?) it wouldn't ruin the outside appearance of the run of windows... it'd just be like punctuation marks either side of the big bay over the bath.

why the old house can't be the dream house

Greg from Petch House asked an interesting question: Why do we not just make the old house into our dream house?

In fact, this is where I started. Dave was more circumspect - more willing to countenance bulldozing and starting from scratch... which is what everyone suggested, but I refused to consider.

I've always loved old houses, especially wooden ones. I think you can sense when a house is a "good house" just by the feeling you get when you walk through it. This old house has that feeling for me, even though it's a wreck, so I thought it'd be a great "heart" to our dreamhouse if we restored it and built onto it.

But, the agreement Dave & I made was that we'd focus on the dream and not restrict it by insisting we had to incorporate the old house. If it did, great, if not, then we'd just build alongside.

When we got further in terms of working through all the details of the dream with Eric, it became clear we were going to have to make *so* many changes to the old house - making it much bigger, adding a second storey, adding chimneys, playing with the roofline, etc - that it risked swamping it and destroying the charm and character. It was also potentially quite limiting in terms of the design.

So, we've decided to build the dreamhouse from scratch, alongside the old house as if they were neighbouring houses in a village. (We have 30 acres so there's enough space). And separately, to restore the old house to be a cottage fitting to its era, retaining its "face" and keeping it as a distinct structure. This means we can be true-er to the old house's spirit, and it'll be a great guesthouse or something we can rent out if hard up for cash. Now that things have reversed and we're restoring the old house first, it'll also be a lovely place to live during the years we build the dreamhouse.

Lest you think the dreamhouse is a huge modern house... that's not it at all.

Most likely it's only going to have two bedrooms and be quite traditional in terms of the materials & styling. But, it'll include all those quirky things we've imagined. Like unusual seating nooks, a sweeping staircase, an entrance hall with room for a grandfather clock, a tower room, etc etc. (To read the full crazy list click here) and here)

If things go to plan, it won't even be a new house - it'll just be newly assembled. We're aiming for most of it to be made from salvaged materials - leftovers from demolition sites of old houses that Dad comes across; various architectural pieces that I find on Ebay, etc. The goal is to build something that has the soul of an old house, that feels like it could have been there for a century or more, but that fits our dream.

It's hugely ambitious and who knows if we'll ever fully get there. But, it's worth trying for and whatever happens it'll be an interesting experience!

seeking ideas for floorplan

Now we're beginning the repairs on the old house, we need to get the floorplan sorted. I have some ideas but would love to get your opinions and suggestions.

It's a bit complicated because we're designing it with two purposes in mind. It will start out as a self-contained cottage which - although small - will be comfortable for Dave & I, or anyone else to live in. Ultimately though, it will serve as an annex suitable for providing upmarket B&B accommodation.

We don't want to impinge on the design of the "dream house" which will be built on the other side of the cloister. We also want to minimise the cost, which means sticking to the current footprint of the house rather than extending it outwards or upwards. Here's the layout at the moment:

It is basically 3 rooms and a hallway. There used to be a lean-to extension at the back which housed the kitchen and bathroom but they weren't covered by the "new" roof and are beyond saving.

Dave and I played around with a few designs tonight. Here's what we've come up with so far. We're going to run them past Eric (our architect) too, just to make sure we haven't made any monstrous mistakes - but he's focusing on the "dream house" so I don't want to distract him! Any ideas and comments are welcome, please just add them below.

First, this would be the plan for it in the cottage mode (click and then select "original size" to get a bigger view). I've drawn in furniture to scale to give a rough idea of space:


Basically, it would have 1 bedroom with ensuite, study / guest bedroom alongside the laundry (reason for this will be clearer in next plan), cosy lounge, leading to dining area and small but functional galley style kitchen.

Second, this would be the conversion to make it suitable for upmarket B&B:

There's no change to the structural walls. The only changes are, the laundry converts to be the ensuite to what is now the second bedroom (formerly the study); the "linen cupboard" converts to a wardrobe; and the giant walk in wardrobe in the first bedroom converts to house built-in bunk beds, so that if we had anyone with kids staying there'd be somewhere for them to sleep. I've seen this "bed in a cupboard" trick done at a Californian B&B in Sonoma and it worked brilliantly. When you're using the bed you have the sliding door open; at other times you keep it shut and no-one's the wiser.

What do you think?

it's all in the silhouette

We just had a phone chat with Eric about how to take things forward with the house planning. Rather than talk in detail through every comment we'd written, Eric instead summarised the key points he'd taken out from reading it to check he'd got the gist. It turned out to be really helpful for us too because he spotted consistencies and key themes that I'd not noticed.

For instance, Eric picked up that the common thread between the houses we've sent pictures of is that they all have a distinctive and often unusual silhouette, especially in terms of the way they relate to the sky. Which seems obvious when you point it out, but it wasn't something I'd explicitly thought of before.

Another point relates to the arrangement and feel of rooms. We're leaning towards rooms that are well-proportioned individually with clearly defined boundaries and roles, rather than spaces that blend into each other. In a sense, we're wanting rooms that have a formality that a lot of more modern open-plan styles often lack - but not in the stuffy sense of the word. But, just as important are the details, with each room having it's own character and intricacies - whether it be in the window shaping, positioning of a nook, or whatever. In a sense, it's these that give each room it's essence.

It's hard to articulate precisely but this feels pretty close and it certainly would explain why I've always much preferred living in old houses to modern ones. Rooms in old houses naturally have intricacies... sometimes designed in from the start because 100 years ago it was more common for buildings to be crafted not just shoved together; other times arising over time just from being lived in. Plus the style of living back then was a little more formal perhaps than nowadays which lended itself to more clearly defined spaces.

Because of this, rather than dive straight into drafting a revised houseplan, Eric is first going to explore some general shapes, especially focusing on the rooflines and details within parts of rooms. He thinks, and we agree, that we'll know instinctively when we find something that works, that captures the feelings we want to evoke. Then that gives us something to build the rest of the design around.

He also loves the idea of having some kind of tower, which is great. I was a little worried he might not be enthusiastic about that as it is rather whimsical! He said it'd be unusual to do in that most of the focus in architecture these days is on simplifying with an emphasis on function - whereas some of the things we're asking for, like the tower, are hark back almost to the "follies" of yesteryear.

Now, when he said the word "follies" my first thought was of those mock castles and gothic arches that scatter the grounds of old stately homes here... which isn't at all what we want! But, I'm not worried because Eric described an example of a kind of architectural folly that is akin to what we want... a "widows walk". Apparently, back when he lived in the US he worked with a team doing some kind of historical buildings surveying. They'd spend several months in each building so in the process he got to know a lot about how old buildings were put together! One of them had this kind of walkway up high off the roof that you could go onto to look out. It was a folly in the sense that you could get the same view virtually from the window, so it wasn't fulfilling any real function.

Anyway, we discussed a few other things but these are the key points... plus, it's late now and I'm too tired to keep writing! I wanted to get down as much as I could tonight so I didn't forget.

Our comments on Eric's house plans

This has taken far longer than anticipated, but at last we've written up our detailed comments on Eric's first iteration of the house plan. Because Eric is in Australia, it's not possible to meet in person to discuss them, which is what I'd guess was normal. So, instead, a way that seems to work is for Dave and I to write up our comments in detail (which also serves to force us to think through exactly what we want to say), send them to Eric to read and then follow-up with a phone conversation to talk them through.

If you're interested, you can download them here although a warning... it's in powerpoint and it is 6Mb so don't try it unless you have broadband and way to open powerpoint files!

Dad's thoughts on the house plans

Below are Dad's thoughts about the house plans so far. Interestingly, like everyone we've shown it to, he much prefers plan A. Here's a picture of the plan A inside layout:

planAcombined
Originally uploaded by lynetter.


Extract from Dad's email - 8th April
I looked at all the options Eric made, and hands down his option A is best all round. You will accept that I am biased towards his first because it looks more in the country style of a large and functional house without any sense of ostentation. It also has the views concentrated towards the best directions. And the large open plan of the lounge, with the one little bedroom makes it emminently suitable for an area exclusive to you and Dave for most of the time, and suits for entertaining as well. Access walking is closer than in B, but will need cars under a carport.
Other parking easy to arrange further uphill.

Dave's shed cum cookery, cum lab, cum study, cum computer room is well placed for the garden access and helps make it an integral part of the rest of the house so won't isolate him while giving him his space. You will understand that you will make your spaces too about the place, and of course there is overlapping. There needs to be machinery storage so keeping the views downhill predominantly will give a place to put these essential structures so they don't impinge on your daily awareness when musing from your house window in the morning or late evening. I have been up at 05:30 and watched manificent sunrises as the light came over the horizon and watched the roos slowly hopping away to where roos go to sleep during the heat of the day.The same at evening. The strength of your block is that it isn't going to be overbuilt so your view won't include house tops. Not overlooking Tex's place is also important.

Will go through and add my notes as I first went through the plan. Need to be able to read Eric's writing to study the details of internal areas.

1.I assume none of existing trees will be sacrificed in placing buildings.

2.Placing main house (option A) downhill of the old house is great:
*a. old house is a shield to uphill stuff.
*b. Lower on block means easier to hide things other side of dam wall , especially container and Tex's sheds.
*c. Two stories doesn't get up too high and look backwards too easily and over the hill edge to see my carport and tank for the hobbit hole. These need to be uphill of the hobbithole and are over against the back fence. Your main tank will be less noticable unless you go to look at it from a small window looking back.
*d. With main tank uphill to supply head pressure for water the secondfloor areas will be able to get pressure for en suites and flooding the gutter with water when a fire threatens. Your gravity system can be supplemented with regional pressure pumps, but in the main you need to avoid reliance on using power to move water for use, except that you need to move water uphill to the main storage tank. This could be under roof and extra roof space for machinery storage.

3.Carport for cars at uphill means walking down when carrying things, and possibly fewer steps. Assume I am referring to option A as I was very taken with this in it's rough outline.

4.Love the two fireplaces. Very livable area that, with options for party space and yet has nooks for separateness.

5. Appearance of house is very much in keeping with old house. Viewed from the road it will look very friendly, spacious, gracious, and not ostentatious. I have worked on houses with front that no one would think of entering, or make use of for daily living. Just for show.

6. Don't think option C idea of connecting old house to new a good one. Old is on wooden stumps, and unless you trouble to replace these( no need), they present a possible access for whiteant infiltration into the new house. With the best will in the world, you cannot avoid thinking about these little blitters when building. They can use a roof connection to span to another structure. I saw the damage they did at Bethany Guest House and warn you that if you ignore them , they will beat you in the end. There are many horror stories, and yet they are able to be bested with forethought.

That is all for now. Tell Eric that I am very pleased with Option A, and parts of the other options which I will comment on later. Of course, this is your house and my thoughts are only for sharing and considering, not necessarily accepting. Planning is so wonderful because the imagination can soar to great heights.
When I get time I will sketch up plans I have for the hobbithole. Not going to have sod on the roof any longer, but will have a nice look in keeping with the concept, but not having the weight of sod roof. May change my mind again before starting. Can't get height I need without going about 2 feet higher than surrounding slope so another type of roof looks likely, probably old tiles that are placed in the shape of the sod roof but steeper.

P.S. Was able to use the pump to move water from the dam. Will check with the pump people to make sure not going to damage the pump doing this. Water scarce now and so will have to move the stock tank over to connect it to the tree watering system and pump water up to this from dam. Will extend this line to pump to the olive tree site too. May connect olive tree tank to lower supply but don't want to get too fancy, as just a temporary measure. Will go up next weekend to do these and deliver another load to the container. Couldn't take but one of the large cupboards in the tool trailer. Will bring back the the tool trailer and take a lot of stuff of Gran's up to store there as it is better. These are the things you wanted to keep. Took all the bottling stuff.

model of downstairs plan A

model of downstairs plan A
Originally uploaded by lynetter.

So, this is going to extremes, but it's Dave's fault as he dared me. He said "No we're not building a scale model" in his best stern forbidding teacher voice. Which really annoys me when he tries to boss me round like that, so of course I did exactly the opposite. It's amazing what you can do with some random angle plates raided from the tool cupboard, paper and profuse amounts of sticky-tape!

the 1st set of architect plans

The mail gods were kind to us... the first set of house plans which Eric prepared turned up yesterday. That's only about a week to get from Australia to London, which is pretty good. I'd thought we'd be lucky if they came before the weekend.

There are 3 options in total, each made up of several A3 pages. This made them a bit difficult to scan, but Dave painstakingly did it in sections and then pieced it all together into a slideshow. You can view them here.

Last night Dave and I spent several hours pouring over them. At this stage, the idea isn't to pick a particular plan, but rather to use them as a series of "what if's". We decided to do it by picking out all the things we liked and all the didn't like about each plan. Dave also went back to the original (incredibly detailed) brief we'd sent, just to remind himself of all the things we'd discussed.

Overall, we have a whole lot of comments on every plan, and some plans sparked ideas that weren't in any of them! Tonight, after we've had a night and a day to think them over, I'll try to write up our thoughts on each option. Right now, if you forced us to pick our favourite of the 3, we agreed it would be option A... but, there are lots of things about option B that we really like too, especially the outer appearance... what I call the "house's face"! In fact, option B is my favourite from the outside. Also, there are a lot of things about option A, as it stands, that we don't like. Anyway, no more commenting for now!.. I'll just finish with an extract from Eric's letter giving his explanation of each plan.

Eric says...

What to look for

"At this stage, I often like to look at very general aspects of the designs like the locations of certain rooms in relation to other rooms. Also, the general look and feel of the buldings. Note any specific features like storage or room sizes that work better than others.

Option A probably comes the closest to strictly answering the design brief. It has the main rooms discussed so far. I've added a walk through dining area because I reasoned that if 10-12 people are visiting for a big meal, it could be difficult to set up a table in a room normally used for something else (therefore losing the use of that room).

Option B would be my preferred direction for the house to take. I like that it is simple and ordered, but less rigid than option A. The form is asymmetrical and the internal spaces connect in more subtle ways than simply walls and doors.

Option C is the black sheep of these options. it is included as a contrast to the other two. Single storey and the courtyard configured differently. Spaces like the study and cooking/eating areas are quite different and shown for discussion purposes.

Siting. I've generally adopted the concept of the buildings being linked together by the private, inward looking garden space. I'll be interested in your thoughts about this"

Summary

"The goal of this early concept stage is to better understand the design problem. On the one hand, this includes understanding the site features which affect the design. On the other hand, a refined understanding of what we want out of the building. At the second design cycle, these can be put together into a good solid concept which suits both your brief and the site. Since I have been absorbed with these designs for the last few weeks, I naturally have some opinions about which options I think work the best, but also encourage you to form some independent opinions of your own."

This is my first experience working with an architect but so far, I am very happy. I would have struggled to get anywhere near to what Eric has done in translating my ideas of rooms and sense of what a space should "feel" like, into practical layouts. If anyone's looking for an architect I whole-heartedly recommend him. Even though he lives in a country town in Australia at the moment, as demonstrated by my experiences he isn't put off by the idea of working with someone on the other side of the world! He's from Oregon originally too, which is one of the things I liked... it means he knows a lot about older styles of building in America (many of which are influences for me), which your typical Australian architect probably wouldn't. So if anyone reading this is thinking about getting some architect input, especially if you're interested in sustainable, energy-efficient building, he might be your answer. Best of all, he charges a flat rate for the first two design cycles, which I found very reassuring compared to other architects where the prices felt open-ended.

email conversations with Eric

Eric is our architect, from Greenpoint design. Over the past week we've had a couple of interesting email conversations that I thought I'd include them here for posterity! I can imagine it will be quite amusing to look back on how we arrived at certain ideas for the design once we're at the other side and the thing is built! Right now, we're just about at the point of getting to see the first iteration of Eric's design, I can't wait.

Here is Eric's email to us from March 8th - and I've interspersed my comments on each point from my email reply:

"I am well and truly back in my office. It's amazing how quickly a week goes. I mentioned that I worked on some concepts for you while in the US. I've continued to developed a couple of ideas since getting back. (It's all on the drawing board and stuck all over the walls of my office right now.) A few themes have emerged which I thought it worthwhile to suggest sooner rather than later.

1. After visiting the site, I feel that the general location of the existing house is a very good one for the rest of the buildings. It is elevated and well drained, has good access and good aspect to both sun and the views to the east.
_________________

Great. Totally sold on that. It felt good to me too instinctively, but I didn't want to insist on it in case there were better spots from an energy efficient point of view.
_________________

2. The existing house seems to be in workable condition. Relatively new roof. The framing will need some repair work, but it is all exposed and easy to get to. Need new linings and finishes both inside and out, but that would give us the opportunity to consider it's appearance in relation to other buildings.
________________

Very glad to hear. Again, you would have had to work hard to convince me to knock it down, so I'm glad we can avoid that discussion! I'm afraid I get very sentimental about old houses, they have a soul to them far more than modern brick veneer boxes do, so I will always err on the side of saving them. I'm also happy to reconsider it's appearance, as I know it is in dire condition at the moment. But my only slight hesitation is that I do like its style and faded grace. Even though I guess it is a bit incongrous for that kind of house to be there, I like the fancy bits around the door and the lovely little mouldings and the fact that they have survived these past decades of neglect. I even like the fake brick moulded thing in wood at the front side. I suppose what I'm saying is that I'm happy to change but I want to be true to the spirit of the old house. e.g., if we are having a little collection of buildings, maybe that can be the old stately home of our mini-village. :-)
________________

3. One scenario is too hard to pass up. It is: use the house as a storage shed for the first stage of building, then once you are comfortable in the main house, fix up the old house into the extra bedrooms and accommodation. Most of my ideas so far have assumed something similar to this. It seems a waste not to use the old house.
_____________________

Happy with this too. I'm so glad you agree it's a waste not to use it! Most other people seem to think we should just raze it, I felt like I was being really stupid to insist on at least considering we keep it. However I must confess that my first reaction (given that I love old houses) was that the guests will get the best bit(!!), but I know that's just because I can't yet envisage what the new parts will look like. It is so annoying... I can envisage various rooms, even wander round them in my dreams sometimes, but I just cannot figure out how they're joined up.
_____________________

4. The new buildings can be either physically connected to the old house or separate. I tend to favour separate buildings for a variety of reasons, but am still very open to options.

5. Siting generally. I'm looking at a matrix of options for how the main house, guest house and other misc outbuilding all relate. Will send some diagrams to help explain options.
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I don't have firm opinions on this yet, I think I'll get a better feel for it when I see some possible layouts. If the old house were to be joined fully, the only place I can envisage it being (so as not to destroy the symmetry) is on the back where the current extension is. I like the concept of keeping it separate though in the sense that it lets it retain its history/sense of identity.
_____________________

6. The English garden space. Just on sheer size of this area (10 x 6 or 9 x 5), it seems to be enclosed by several buildings (and/or gar