DISCUSSING CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES TODAY THis plan is just genius. A couple of a

DISCUSSING CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES TODAY

THis plan is just genius. A couple of additional ideas:

1) The master in this plan is elevated by three steps (that’s 3×8=24″). Now, I hate sleeping on the first floor. (No idea why.) But it doesn’t take much to raise a room above the ground level and avoid that feeling other than the windows have to be impossible to look into from the outside. So, with a little work it’s possible to expand the width of the MBR closet, as well as the stairs up to the MBR, as well as the stairs up to the Study, and raise the master up another two to three feet, for a total of maybe five feet above ground level. Be cautious with the windows and make the master doors open to a porch rather than the ground and that’s it. This would have the effect of increasing both the closet (which is too small), and reducing the space consumed in the upstairs loft/study by the stairs, which is also too small.

2) the house is easily oriented for different approaches by flipping the entry/powder and entering from the opposite side of the house. (The entry way is brilliant and inviting.) And I would make it possible to shut off the entry/sitting area from the rest of the house with something as simple as doors.

3) My friend Todd Colby, (who refuses to join FB), is a fan of the highly insulated and cheap to heat and cool house. So we discussed how to construct foot-thick (or more) highly insulated walls. This would allow the feeling of mass that comes from stone or timber work, without the thermal mass, but also, without the expense of heating and cooling the thermal mass. Todd is worried about construction of anything other than stick built homes given the problems with finding crews that can work on alternative technologies. Which I completely understand. Although I ‘m not quite sold on anything that I can’t believe will last two hundred years. 🙂