Having never thought we'd be in the position of designing a house from scratch, we were overwhelmed by the prospect. Through a work colleague of my partner, we got in touch with an architectural technologist that specialises in passive houses and low energy homes. His style is quite simple and very much what we were after.
We met up, got on very well, and spent the next 9 months designing our future home.
We went through 12 drafts before we were happy. To say we're indeci
Back in June 2017 we found a house for sale close to us in Holywood, Co. Down - 4 bed bungalow, 115m2 on a large plot on one of the best streets in the town. Within our budget. Couldn't believe it! So we put in a offer at the asking price. Didn't hear anything back. Phoned the agent a few days later and bidding was going on way above our offer... developers with cash. Obviously they saw it a potential site. So, we accepted our loss and moved on. Then, two months later, it appeared back on the ma
So this one has been 10 years in the making, which is when I originally built this extension, and not long after i'd built it, the outdoor bunny became an indoor bunny! So the glorified rabbit hutch has now become the kitchen it was intended to be. Worktops just been installed. Will crack on with tap, dishwasher, hob, and oven later this week. Really pleased with it all, just need to choose some paint, but will sort that in the autumn, as I've got the old kitchen to rip out and the room to bare
During the year of waiting for the planning refusal, we (or more accurately Peter) has been busy in the gardens, getting things sorted.
The kitchen garden is coming along nicely. The trees and bushes have settled down and it looks like we are in for a bumper crop this year. We have 6 IBCs that will be filled over the winter to use in the drier months. We have an additional 2 IBCs by the house which will collect the initial rainfall, before it is pumped to where we need it in the
Phew, today we said goodbye to our house and moved out and said Hello to our new house, approximately 8 minutes down the road - about 6 miles away to a caravan site. With Covid we were able to negotiate a 4 month deal (we weren't due here til 1 July but our existing knackered flat roof started to leak so negotiated coming early).
It's luxury compared to our living arrangements for the past 2 years. We aren't eating, working and sleeping in the same room, have instant hot water, heati
We purchased a kitchen - oops!
I've been set on handless, but haven't been keen on the J handles I'd seen and I wanted a mixture of wood handleless and another colour though the other half wasn't keen on handleless. I had in my head orange but I couldn't quite get the shade I wanted without customising it (so decided something neutral and paint the walls would be cheaper) and then DIY kitchens didn't do wood effect handleless although the quality of the base units was better than som
Drama broke out earlier today with the discovery of our water pipe. Discovered by the digger going though it....
A few months ago in the absence of locating our internal stop tap (likely because it's somewhere behind the fitted kitchen units) the water company came out to try and locate the external one. Three house after they arrived....
No.such.luck
They did say it's somewhere between the houses the other side of the bridge and us - but there is a canal and
In the last few months work on the house was on hold because of the COVID 19 pandemic. With the rules starting to be relaxed we have now been able to make some progress.
A few months ago I posted on BH about being a bit concerned about the bath being a tight fit as it’s 1800mm and the distance between the wall was 1802mm. Not sure how the plumber got it in but happy that it fills the space.
The bath is made from Carronite so it should feel more rigid when sho
Today was our four year wedding anniversary. It was also Day 1 of the builders starting promptly at 730am and as we got the day off work we decided to leave them to it and escape.
Since the cancelled Ideal Home show and home associated birthday plans in March I've been online adding things to my ever growing Pinterest board and my particular obsession has been a bath and although we had done some browsing before lockdown I hadn't seen anything that really caught my eye.
<drum roll>.....we have our planning application approval! yay!!
I was really expecting a long drawn out process but pretty much a month after we hired our planning consultant we got our approval.
I'm pretty gobsmacked to be honest but we're over the moon. can't believe it all happened so quickly.
I had discussions with the planning consultant about what we were willing to compromise on and what we weren't. we also determined what we could potentially b
With the lock down continuing it’s been hard to keep our enthusiasm levels up without the required supplies to continue any major projects. It’s been a case of “what can we do today” picking off tasks.
The gas boiler needed to be plumbed in, nice easy job as screwfix and toolstation were operating click and collect. Good to get a job ticked off.
Our electrics had got to pretty much second fix stage, so we ordered an 12 way RCBO consumer unit, sockets and isolator switches
It has been 3 weeks since the last Blog post and in some ways it feel an eternity and in others it seems only yesterday since Plot 1 TF was done - which is where we left the story.
So lots and lots has happened since then so this entry will cover 'lots of stuff' in one go. Our main aim is to get both shell buildings up and then get them wind and watertight as soon as possible. The heavy rain we had just after Plot 1 was finished showed that the MBC OSB roof is not in any way watertight as
One question my dad asked me on Saturday.
He only came up to get rid of a tree stump in the garden that's been there since Storm Doris blew down our Silver Birch. Job done, we thought whilst he had the digger he could tackle 7 other stumps in a large overgrown border near our drive.
He then asked the question he would now probably regret and was met with a response of "we will probably extend the drive at some point".
He looked at my like he did when I'd told
So finally managed to update the blog. Seems like nothing happened , but a bit of progress still.
Now just have to get this monstrosity past Building Control . Challenging task but I will manage. As always. I can tell I will not become a Groundworker in this life . Or the next.
http://tintabernacle.blogspot.com/2020/05/rc-beam-or-ringbeam-preparation.html
Here are some entertaining pics from this :
Above ground shuttering takes a bit of timbe
Buildhub member @NSS is doing a cycle marathon in his bedroom (OK, that's an exaggeration; it's in his shed ... maybe) to raise some money for a favoured cause during lockdown.
I have my own slightly mad cycling project, amongst several others.
I tried to get a local forum going a few years ago, which went exactly nowhere. So I’m trying again with an FB group whilst there are about 5x as many cyclists around ... many going up and down my lane. In adjacent areas great thin
An auspicious crane day as a Red Kite flies in front of our crane as it is installing the Timber Frame for Plot 1 ?
Its been a while as life has been really hectic and keeping up with things on site have meant little time for the blog. This one is exciting and the video shows the MBC Timber Frame for Plot 1 (our son Joe's house) from start to finish. We have cut this to be chronological and cut out the days MBC were not on site so the build looks continuous.
The build seq
Why is it so hard to get planning approval? Such a simple thing is mired in bureaucracy, pettiness (at least perceived), personal interpretations of the planning policy (e.g. the definition of disproportionate to the existing building) and, in some cases, pure incompetence!
One such example was from Southern Water who said they couldn't approve the proposal with a sewage treatment plant and we had to apply for connection to an existing sewage system. err....the nearest sewer is about
Sad I know, but really excited for my bargain MVHR unit to turn up today. Given it a quick test, and all is OK, will be a while before I get everything else sorted out, but hoping to have it all installed before the winter comes this year.
Don't think it was too bad for £420, and I had £25 in vouchers to use from Nectar points!
Its getting installed in a cupboard in the new dining room, and then all the pipe work and manifolds will be in the loft space of the
These are two Gresham lectures by the Chris Whitty, the Chief Medical Officer.
Gresham Lectures are free lectures in London, funded by a legacy from Sir Thomas Gresham (1519-1579).
The first was on the centenary of the Spanish Flu epidemic, looking at the history of pandemics.
The second is on COVID-19 Coronavirus.
Once we'd exchanged on the bungalow we knew that completion would happen and so we didn't waste any time in interviewing and hiring an architect. We got 3 different architects to come round to see us (it was supposed to be 4 but the 4th didn't seem to be interested as after I phoned and left a message with details as to what we wanted I got a voicemail back saying he'd received a message about an extension or something rather than the complete demolition and self-build we're doing! it goes witho
A long time ago (about 15 years) in a county not so far away I met and married my wife. Soon after we had a couple of kids and started thinking about our future.
When I was a teenager my parents moved us abroad and built their own house and I think that sowed the seed for me as it seems that I've always wanted to build my own house and would sit down and watch Grand Designs back in the day and be drawn to the idea of it all.
So about 10 years ago we decided that we wante
Following on from the plastering work we did a quick stock take. Our plan was to be back on our narrow boat for the summer but with the current problems that was out of the question. We didn’t have materials to start flooring or fit bathrooms or kitchen and there was little hope of getting them. After a bit of head scratching and phoning around we found we could get fencing material and paint. We also had a few other jobs on the list that we could tackle, commissioning the water harvesting syste
