Concrete Thinking

It's now time to crank into gear.  We got loan approval (YAY!!!) and hopefully we can see dirt moving around within a month.  Once that happens, I will know it's real.  Right now - it's been a lot of "models" and SketchUp pictures, and samples of materials and meetings, and and and....

We had a few goals for this house:

1. All one level.  This is important because we wanted to "age in place" (holy crap - I am not moving again!) and we also have handicapped and/or blind dogs.  They have been a very good "guide" on how beings struggle as they age - and we also wanted to make their lives as comfortable as possible.  Thus - no stairs.  And no stairs in and out of the house.
2. Low Maintenance.  Our current house is cedar.  Lovely to look at, a pain to maintain.  When I work outside or on the house, I want to see CHANGE!  I am not interested in a "fussy" house.
3. Energy Efficiency.  Current house has a geothermal heat pump, Low e-squared double pane windows, either blown cellulose or recycled blue jean material.  Our electric bills are low.  I'd like to keep them that way.  And really, it's hedging your bet against future energy cost increases.  We live in a country with really low energy costs.  I am not sure it can stay that way forever.
4. Architecturally appealing / Modernist.  Luckily, Raleigh has a wonderful Modernist community of architects and builders (probably due to the excellent NC State School of Design nearby).  personally, I am a fan of midcentury modern design - long / low, horizontal lines, clean aesthetic, etc.

One of the first decisions was wall construction.  We decided on a concrete sandwich panel - 3" of exterior concrete, 4" of insulation and 3" of interior concrete.  We visited with a local company - International Precast - and saw their model home.  We were seriously impressed with the quality of the finish and the overall flexibility of the material.  We also noted that their model home "hid" the concrete and that was not something we wanted to do - we wanted to CELEBRATE it!

Some random initial thoughts / requirements for the house were:

• No sheetrock.  Hubby hates it.  The finish never looks all that good.  it's hard to keep "clean" and overall - it's not that awesome of a material.  We were not sure we'd eliminate it fully - but it was  / is a goal.
• Truth in materials / design.  NO FAUX!  if it's concrete - let it look like concrete.  If it's steel - celebrate it's "steely goodness".

Obviously - concrete sandwich panels fit the bill.

Here's a picture from sketch up of the house.  And we'll be posting more on the materials as we continue.

Anything worth doing... is worth overdoing...

Rewind time....  As I await (mega) loan approval, I ask myself, how did we get here?  How did we get to building a "LEED Platinum of Bust" home when this started with a discussion about building a modern home, all on one level (better for aging in place for both humans and dogs...), on acreage, with a shop / guesthouse building for our hobby activities.

Sounds simple right?  Find an architect, back and forth with some plans, make tough decisions like maple or cherry.... and start building.

I knew it wouldn't be that easy, but I am a fan of gross oversimplification, so that was the hope.

Anyone that knows my DH (dear husband) knows that he's the epitome of the title of this blog post.  He's not a "good enough" kind of guy.  He's an engineer.  His brain works differently than mine.  I am perfectly comfortable with a 80% solution as long as it meets my overall goals (that can include a time / cost / effort element).  DH is a 100% kind of guy.  We kinda did this when we built our first house.  We had contracted with a builder who was to build us a "custom" home.  Little did he know what he was getting into, and we were not all that smart about what custom meant.  Apparently, custom in a neighborhood meant: painted spindles for your railings, or stained?  I don't think either of us were well prepared.

So - as we started off on this venture with the rather simple requirements above - I should have known we'd build in complexity.  I knew we would be building a house that is energy efficient - our current home was built to a standard that far exceeded code, and we built that when gas was $1.30 a gallon.  We're not cheap - we're "frugal" and we believe that we should embrace low operating costs to ensure that things like our heat / light bill does not get totally out of hand should we see big increases in energy costs.  We also would like to be good stewards of the environment.

The energy efficiency path had a more natural fit to LEED (Leadership in Environmental and Energy Design).  Often, things like this are just buzzwords.  "Green" is one of my most nonfavorite words.  Too nebulous.  Homebuilders all over are calling themselves "green" and yet there's still tons of garbage being generated, VOCs streaming around in paint and cabinetry, formaldahyde in cabinets, etc.  But hey - we're "green"....  But LEED quantifies your decisions and takes a much more holistic approach to homebuilding.

LEED has 4 levels - Certified, Silver, Gold and Platinum....  you see where I am going with this, don't you?  Next time we'll talk about our building materials decisions.....

Call me crazy - we're gonna do it....

After years of thinking about it, and months of wondering about it, and hours and hours of working on it - we're going to BUILD IT!

I am renewing my commitment to this blog and will be documenting the design, build and decision making process of building a new modern, energy efficient (understatement alert) home.

Last year, we tried to buy a modernist home that was on the market in Raleigh.  It was "close" to what we wanted but not exactly.  It was too contemporary (and not modern enough), too big, and not very efficient.  On the plus side - it had a SHOP for Henry and a go kart track (which I think would have been more used than the pool I want, but who knows....)  Anywho - after a long and drawn out process, we didn't get it - and that's okay - because - like I said - it was a very nice house- but not "perfect" (whatever that means...)

So - we decided to meet with several architects featured on George Smart's great website - Triangle Modernist Houses.  We'd participated in several of the tours sponsored by TMH, and really enjoyed the flavor and style of the Modernist movement that is alive and well in good old Raleigh, NC.

We started the process by having us both (DH and I) write down a list of "potentials" from the voluminous information on TMH.  Because each architect is profiled along with photos of his /her work, as well as many architects having had homes on the tours, we felt this was a great jumping off point.  We then narrowed and compared the lists for matches.  Where we had differences, we each took a second look and explained why that architect did not make the cut.  There were several architects that we really liked, but... we had limited our search to mostly "design / build" firms or architects with a close relationship.  Then, on the matches, we interviewed.

After narrowing it down - we ultimately had 2 first develop some designs and rough plans as well as provide rough estimates of cost.  (And yes, this was a while ago - we've been at this for over a year now.)  Because this is such an involved process, and because it's so important to be able to work side by side with your architect and builder, and because we'd never seen a house that we didn't like, and really, because things just CLICKED - we ultimately chose tonic design | tonic construction.

I think we've spent the better part of a year annoying the heck out of the team (Vinny Petrarca, Katherine Hogan and Maggie Kirsch), challenging them on contractor selections, costs / benefit analysis, building techniques and pushing the energy efficiency envelope - we're ready to start.

Now, if we can just get the banks to cooperate...  but more on that later.

Up next - LEED Platinum or bust....  (alternate title, Go Big or Go Home....)