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caliwag

A blog by caliwag in General

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About this blog

Retired architect, occasional blogger on other forums, always curious!

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Entries in this blog

Windows (not the computer ones)

Modern Houses, especially developer built ones, seem to have extremely mean windows...not helped by extremely thick frames and mullions. Consider the room you're in now. What effect would it have if the sill(s) were 18" higher or indeed 18" above floor level. The former would be be rather depressing, the latter quite enlivening, particularly if you have an interesting view, or likely to collect winter sun.   Our old friends Chris Alexander et al in A pattern Language have much to contr
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Village home in Yorkshire

A diversion, but with reference to earlier blogs.   I usually buy the Times on Fridays for the excellent property section 'Bricks and Mortar' which has been running for quite a few years now. Unfortunately they operate a paywall, so it's not so simple, and annoying, to quote from the paper, I find.   However in the recent edition (3 November '17) in the section called Prime Properties, they briefly review a 17th century cottage, a true doll's house, with the 'Downside comment
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Two Gardeners

I mention in an earlier blog the desirability of considering the outdoor spaces and gardens at the same time as the house design.   Circulation and spatial thinking are very similar to the house layout. Making decisions about entrances and thresholds, capitalising on views and vistas, (to say nothing of orientation and overlooking/shadowing...See Survey blog) sitting places in morning and evening sun as well as dappling if you cannot stand direct sun! It's a good idea to list activitie
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The Wee House Company

Came across this earlier c/o a Homebuilding and Renovating Ad post. Fascinating outfit and based on traditional Northern vernacular...I understand that these modest houses wouldn't suit the massive collection of sofas and picture window brigade but hey what a great starter or retirement home...It's an excellent website too extending to options, interviews and videos of processes etc. Well done the team and Lady behind it all.   http://theweehousecompany.co.uk/
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Spatial Excitement

Aye, this was a question raised on another forum, some time ago, and my thoughts. Whether 'Passive House Design should or would spawn spatially exciting architecture?' To my mind passive house design can end up with too much glass, which seems to be trend in new houses. That in itself provoked an inconclusive discussion, mainly based on heat loss versus heat gain...To be honest the jury seemed to be out on that one, without active participation of occupants to open and close external shutters an
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Solutions for making a small house feel big

Aye, the subtitle of a book, that inspires me, by Diane Maddex called "Wright Sized Houses". Published in 2003 (about  £20 on ABEbooks), this is a dissection of some of Frank Lloyd Wright's house designs over six decades. He lived from 1867 to 1959.    As the title implies, he shows how, amongst his big houses on huge spreads in the States, his tenets apply equally to small houses on conceivably restricted sites. Commenting on FLW's attitudes to entrances Ms Maddex writes "...You could
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Small garden ideas from Pinterest

I attach some thoughts from Pinterest about small garden spaces. The key is the three dimensional nature of the designs...a clue to success. A clue to garden design is to itemise/list nice to haves, needs and wants, taking into account views, overlooking, climate and seasons, indeed not dissimilar to house layout, and of course changes in fashion, plant growth etc. Another must is to observe sun angles (OK that's climate and seasons) but it's easy to make assumptions. Obviously think about famil
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Site analysis

Covered in detail in an earlier blog, and in the book, but it is/was the mantra of a former colleague and tutor Par Gustaffson, a Swedish Landscape architect, who undoubtedly brought a logical approach to the design table. Essentially, to avoid confusion, mistakes and oversights, you should divide a garden or landscape overview into three separate themes.   1 A survey of the physical and factual site elements, including topography, planting, existing structures, weather across the seas
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Shipping container/office

I don't suppose many of you see the Yorkshire Post newspaper which is emblazoned with the banner headline 'Yorkshire's National Newspaper' erm!   Anyway this conversion is neatly handled, in my view, even with expensive steel doors   https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/lifestyle/homes-gardens/for-sale-shipping-container-that-s-now-a-stylish-office-garden-room-1-8992743 
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self build book

Howdy, my self build book, selling OK thanks, costs quite a lot as an 'on-demand' exercise (£10 printing and binding...maybe a touch more but I have a friendly printer)  £3 post + £2 packing...one those secure and snug commercial, folding jobs!)...anyway I'm not complaining though I do resent the commercial outfits that don't even reply or acknowledge the free copy for comment...you know who you are!...how much energy or cost does it take to Email 'thanks but no thanks...good luck' ? The realiti
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Self build book

My book 'self-build Home...the last thing you need is an architect' is now available in kindle form Amazon as an option...you'll get a few pages as an introductory sample. Any questions email lofthousestudioAThotmail.com Thanks, Jim
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Seeing through Fashion

This is a blog that I posted a while back on another forum that encourages people to look beyond prejudices fashion wth a view to  exploring a pre-owned house that on first glance does not meet up with expectations and even the list of wants.   A Peter Aldington House, near Doncaster, from 1967 (arguably one of the finest Post War Architects in the UK) recently changed hands. It was sold via a bold estate agent calling themselves "The Modern House" Plainly this doesn't mean a house tha
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Poche`

Ha, French for pocket: Not a term much used in building or design.   A few blogs ago, I described a way of considering garden design as an alternative to creating borders and cutting shapes out of a lawn, or indeed starting in one corner and making shapes, of just planting specimen plants towards another corner. This is a more holistic approach based on listing all conditions of the garden (see site analysis blog), then listing wants, needs, desires, uses of spaces etc for the proposed
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Local authority obligations for self build plots

Hello, A piece of 'legislation' I wasn't aware of.   https://www.righttobuildportal.org/?utm_source=Custom+Build+Strategy+Main+Database&utm_campaign=f0c0a00506-NOV_2017_PROFILE_1&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c5b24ee15a-f0c0a00506-176850693   This info came on an email today, I guess via the people behind Buildit magazine and the Custom build strategy team ( NSB+RS) in Swindon.I assume that's all Castle Media! All very interesting and poignant.   I di
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Kitchens, the hub of the house?

I recently came across a Facebook article on kitchen design tends for 2018...well according to the article, there doesn't seem to be any new ideas. A larger sink was mooted, but the one illustrated was long but single...what? Surely that's pretty old thinking (You have a sink full of washing up and somebody waltzes into the kitchen with half full teacups, and err! I'm not a fan of dishwashers, especially for small loads...that's not my point: double sinks minimum please. I suppose there must be
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15

Kettles Yard

Aye, a bit of a diversion here. One of my students alerted me to this place a few years ago. It is an expanding arts centre, now owned by Cambridge University, but set up by Jim Ede and his wife. in the 50s. It started as a cluster of small cottages, converted to a home, gallery and workshop to display the couple's interesting collection of 20th century art. The point is that the cottages were tiny and the whole now is an interesting exercise in creating the best from a finite space. The Univers
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How and where to start your design

My old tutor used to say 'a design is like the old joke about a spittoon...it's all in one' Dreadful I know. but I say this because it's difficult to isolate much of the reasoning behind decision making...you could be forcing the impact of a preconceived idea around the design but discounting relevant derived thinking from a site analysis. See later blog  For this reason I am not a fan of plan books, certainly they may spark off a new direction of a way of handling circulation but are limiting..
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House on a narrow plot

This was a response to a forum thread (elsewhere) and something that has been touched on in an earlier blog.   I designed a small mock coach house, at the end of a very long  garden. (It was mock to the planners, and a possible nimby backlash, and their were no coaches) The site was less than 5.6m and agreement had been reached to build on the boundary thus leaving an internal width of 3.6m. Plainly there were no projections over the neighbour's land and the wall and gutters etc were d
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House form...fundamental stuff

This is something fundamental to the approach to his design...getting rid of or reducing prejudices of what a house looks like. Houses, along with all buildings to my mind, should be designed from the inside out...sort out the needs, wants, desires, must haves and so on with as few preconceptions as possible.For many this is impossible and undesirable, but it does help to free up the thinking at the early stages. Ask serious estate agents and they will tell you that, given a choice, more people
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Gardens

Hello again...a recent Pinterest garden design vision of approaches...if you don't like lawns! Well you've got to pamper them and cut then 20+ times a year   https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/455074737339246882/?lp=true
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Garden ideas

I make a point of thinking about the window/house relationship to the garden spaces at an early stage of self build design, in my book...'Self build design...the last thing you need is an architect' and associated blogs. I have a mate who attends and sells at garden furniture shows around the country, seasonally of course, but you would be amazed how much people spend. Of course you do need to have the 'designed' infrastructure for any furniture to work and look good! There are a couple of blogs
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Future ebook

Please click on lofthousestudioAThotmail.com if you may be interested in a copy of an E-book of 'Self Build Home...the last thing you need is an architect'
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Front Gardens

This is a follow-up of a discussion that has taken place on a couple of forums in the past.   A book that I have not referred to in my book to be found in cargocollective.com/selfbuildhome is Bernard Rudofsky's 'Behind the picture window'  an excellent little book from 1955 by a writer, teacher and architect. (Sadly £50+ on ABEbooks.co.uk) It is written from an American perspective, though the sentiments seem to apply equally to the UK. Indeed when I worked for a speculative house-buil
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Details and Joinings

Ok, Spell check always pulls me up when I use the word 'joinings', but it is the most succinct and appropriate word for how materials, and planes meet...OK it's a clumsy and ugly word, but then...Are you ahead of me here? So many of the inelegant bodges you can get if you leave it to chance. I would have to say that if you involve an architect on your project, you should end up with no visual nasty detailing, junctions and the "how the hell do we get round this" type of phone call.  
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Design Book

Hello, If any readers have bought, read, borrowed etc my book 'Self Build Home...The last thing you need is an architect' (only £5 on Amazon btw) I welcome your feedback, comments, criticism. Jim on lofthousestudio@hotmail.com I know I've been critical of plan books on here and other forums, but I thought, for my second edition (!?)I'd include plan designs of some of my projects (realised and doomed), but illustrating and annotating a few important (well I think they are!) design features. Just
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