Ferdinand

This - "the Nigella of DiY". "Julia has spent 30 years perfecting her power-tool techniques" Now behave . You can go on a one day course for £385 for which you get 1/12 of the attention. Credit: http://www.juliakendell.com

Ann Maurice? She got the IP in the web name somehow :-). https://www.ipo.gov.uk/tm/legal/decisions/2004/o03204.pdf They started up again last year with a different presenter. "House Doctor returned to Channel 5 for a new series on 3 October 2016 with American interior designer Tracy Metro replacing Ann Maurice. Channel 5 have ordered 45 new episodes." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_Doctor Ferdinand

Kevin McCloud of Clan McLoud is an Interior Designer. (GD C4) Charlie Luxton is an Architectural Designer. (small spaces, Building the Dream etc on C4) Sarah Beany is a Property Developer. (Double the House for Half the Money and others). Building Dream Homes (BBC2) seem to have a panel of architects invited on. Kieran Long is an Eng Lit Graduate who writes about archecture and is a bod at the V&A. (House that 100k Built). George Clarke *is* an Architect. (Amazing Spaces, Restoration Man for C4). Getting desperate, The House Doctor is a property marketing something. Are there any others? I seem to recall an interesting one who could have been created by Wooster called Jolyon or Tarquin or Rupert or similar who was half of the boffin team for the Restoration programme about bids for National Lottery money. Ferdinand

Welcome. Consider carefully whether to make the purchase conditional on you finding a way ahead. However, a resale sounds feasible perhaps with a value increase, but you could get clumped by second home 3% Stamp Duty in the meantime for an expensive round trip. You will need to check where you are with Stamp Duty and what happens if you buy land and resell without building. You could of course reapply for what you want then Appeal the Refusal. Would need a good Planning Consultant to tell you whether that might work and do it. F

There was a brilliant Grand Design in Falmouth by Kathryn Tyler. Cornwall that put the double garage underground at the bottom that would have been a suitable idea here. Called "Lizard Peninsula, 2010". House itself pcs, here: http://www.linea-studio.co.uk/album/corkellis_house.html Slideshow Designer presentatiion: I love the boyf draped subversively and seductively over the staircase-with-no-banisters. Ferdinand

Ideally I would like to see a site plan explaining access, relation to the "existing house", where roads are, precise orientation (North arrow), and exactly which bit of land you will get to keep. My feeling is that you know lots of attractive items and rooms from different places that you like and have on your scrapbook, which is good, but that you are thinking from those and perhaps not enough from an integrated idea of how they will fit together to make your house that works for you. And it needs work from both ends. As it is, that core concept is being provided by the architect - and that is for you to create. I will mainly address the relationship to the site and garden. You have lots of good feedback on the designs. It looks a fantastic plot, with the only downside being (I think, digging) that you have a road all the way round your garden side. I am not sure about that huge shared access; to my eye separate drives (yours against the boundary) on the other side would be superior as they would keep cars away from the private side, and less complex legally, but you may be stuck with that. You need to pay a lot of care to your boundary treatment with the road ... perhaps an 8-10ft high, thick, evergreen hedge and shrubbery in front to soften it to shut them out. Do that right, and you get a private oasis around your "villa". I like the entrance sequence from the first design. You park your car and go into a door in a corner without being able to know about what is beyond. Then you go through the hall and into the living area to see the sweep of garden and turn your back on the world and the house close by in your private oasis. Good and unwinding. Then the habitable rooms in both designs are mainly on that private S and W side, with circulation and service on the North (ish), garage, car, and neighbour side. I can think of 2 guiding concepts that seem to fit the site: "private oasis" is one. The other is "clearing in the woods" with an informal woodland garden - so you plan the rooms where you will spend most time on the side where you see the private garden, rather than the side you approach from. I would suggest working a bit more at the core concept and how you will use the house, integrated with the garden. Jamie's "usage cases" suggestion is great, as would be building a few physical models. What about visiting some houses to get ideas - a good justification for some AirBNB trips or B&Bs in Grand Designs, to houses which may be similar or places where design will be at a premium (eg compact urban flats). Or shamelessly exploit some estate agents by making fake visits. Or there are "Open House" events everywhere. On the question you actually asked , I would try and setup the family area so that it gets 3 aspect sun, and have a covered patio outside for summer breakfast, BBQs etc. I wonder about making the room above the garage into a possible teenage den or office-studio as a second purpose, to keep the racket far away and give privacy. And I think your bathrooms are perhaps too large, but the showers themselves not generous enough. I like showers big enough to step back and have a good appreciative look at the person you are (hopefully) sharing the shower with, or to be well away while the water is heating up, or to have space for a garden chair or stool to sit on while cutting nails or shaving your legs. Ideally, I like the same footprint as a bath. On the second design I am not sure about the Master above the garage facing the neighbour, the driveway, and the North. And I think you perhaps have too much circulation space ... width of corridors etc. There are technical bits ... eg on your pair of ensuites between beds 3 and 4 the loos are positioned to wake up next door when you flush it at 3am, rather than against the bedroom where they are the ensuite. That will all come out when you reflect on it later. Compare your design 2 to his initial design on this score ... but those gotchas are what architects are partly for, One caution: you are near Aberdeen so (given current oil, Sindy etc) perhaps (?) pay some attention to future sales prospects - eg don't bust the ceiling price by too much.

Again ... really just adding grist to the mill. You know your situation and your various relationships best, and what is desirable / expedient. But I think that by definition something which is a Planning Condition cannot be considered under a Non-Material Amendment in Fife: There may be a complex interplay between the two different PPs - not clear whether changes to the first PP affect the second PP and how. What happens could be intricate, and it is possible to induce planning officers to say no by asking too much. In the end you will get what is best for you. I will be a little quieter for a few days now. No one is as familiar with the regs as they would like to be :-).

Non Material Amendments. Briefly, it might be worth looking at what elements of the original you wish to keep options to do, and it may be that by asking for an NMA before the original PP expires it would be more difficult in practice for them to refuse. That means in the next few days. You will be familiar with the Fife NMA Guidance of course, which seems to give quite a lot of leeway. http://publications.fifedirect.org.uk/c64_NonMaterialVariationFeb17.pdf The side window is moot as it is a PC, but I would suggest taking a look through just in case there are Planning Matters where you want to lock in an option. Two useful threads which explore the ambiguities: Some people on here have obtained big changes via NMA; others have been given the planning bastinado for cosmetics. Very much a lottery. @Sensus is the expert on those threads, but is temporarily not active it seems. I would suggest your strongest technique will be to demonstrate support from your neighbours if you can if you want anything that affects them, so that will spike the Council desire to send out consultations by supplying the answers first. The ideal way is perhaps for you to draft an appropriate letter from them, and they then sign it and send in with your request. Are you sure that you can extend a PP without a full reapplication? In England we could do that for a bit in the recession, but it went away in about 2012. Perhaps you still can in Scotland.

Addressing your Planning Condition comments from a previous post. >E/W elevations - we've houses either side (one existing, one in planning) and we have a Planning Condition relating to that >"No windows or openings shall be formed in the east or west elevations of the dwelling hereby approved" That would make me slightly annoyed partly because they already had a granted PP which violates it, and partly because I reckon it is unlawful. Talking about the pipeline side, you have a clearance of at least 7m at 90 degrees. The purpose of PCs is to make a dev acceptable in Planning Terms, and to safeguard the amenity of neighbours. Here there are multiple ways you could safeguard the amenity of neighbours without banning openings ... eg for ground floor a condition to install a 2m fence, or to make sure that windows can only look straight out via obscure glazing or deep narrow window bars (think fins on office buildings). No need at all for it to be so broad. Even Fife Council's own fugging blessed Guidance Document has tables and diagrams demonstrating acceptable window arrangements in exactly your situation without any need for a fence or obstruction. http://publications.fifedirect.org.uk/c64_Minimumdistancesbetweenwindowopenings.pdf And the PP is granted so you know exactly where you have to be in relation to the windows on the other house. And if they are obscured there is no in-looking so perhaps you don't need to worry anyway (maybe overlooking of garden excepted if they are able to use it). Perhaps we could have a thread about that condition in the light of the requirements. I think I am about right, but would value critique of my view. >We also had to change the the Dining Room window to a high height narrow window - it was either that or obscure glass. Similar considerations, but closer and with the other property built. That is now a sunk cost, however, and I think you can only shift it via a Full PP or an Appeal against the condition within 12 weeks of receiving PP. And perhaps you are willing to tolerate it.

i just proposed a variant on that to @AliMcLeod for access to his back garden. With pictures. Wheelbarrow and bike ramp. Or grooves in side walls of a flight of steps and a hook at the top for a winch. Bike wheeling grooves are becoming more prevalent everywhere now. Great minds. F Piccies:

Not a good implementation. You need two so the balance each other.

Suggest starting a thread about lifts on the forum. We do not have one. Someone will have done a lift or thought about it. Though I do know about putting holes in ceilings. We last talked about that on BH wrt to putting snooker tables above garages :-). The question is what size you want in the lift and the footprint. 1.2m x 1.1m seems to be doable for a standard wheelchair lift. This one has no roof or underground structure, being self-supporting. https://www.stiltz.co.uk/trio-home-lift-overview/ But it may need things around it to look attractive and part of the design, and then you have 3 storeys. I think you could perhaps fit provision for one in your entrance, perhaps with minor adjustments.

More to say on Planning Matters including your deadline, but will do that on the later article thread or separate comment. >Placement of read window - good spot, and you're right that the avatar on the drawing is misleading. Here's the section from a later drawing: I think the basic point here is that you are the Client, and he is the Architect. What do you want when you are leaning on the banister in your pyjamas or walking downstairs? It is your building and you will be living in it for 20 years. IMO one of the benefits of the dentist and teeth like process you are documenting has been that you have learnt (and are demonstrating) how to get such decisions right balancing many different factors. Have the courage of your convictions, in context, whichever way you decide. >I wanted full height glass here (the original design had this), but our architect was adamant it would cause overheating and he liked the drama of the window placement with the landing - I'm still not convinced. There's not a view as such out the north elevation (occasional train and school playing field) but if we're going to change something (and we'd have to go back to planning) this would be near the top of the list. Heh. Perhaps you need to have the architect explain how a North facing window (ie no sun) in a house built North of Edinburgh (= cool climate) on the Scottish East Coast (= cool air) with a largely glass South facing facade (= maximum cause of overheating if there is any) is going to cause a material increase in 'overheating'. With calculations and/or models. Peraonally I would be a little skeptical. If you need to manage the excess sun on your North facing window (or even the South facing ones) there are things like effective transparent solar film available. Have discussed recently on here. >Kitchen doors - the original plans had exactly what you've suggested, with the sink on the north wall in front of a window and a side door leading around to the garden, but we made a conscious effort to change that as we like to BBQ and wanted direct access to the back garden. We also very rarely stand in front of the sink for anything other than a minute or so. I actually meant replace you 5m bifold with one set of patio doors or french Widows (so to keep outside access) and then extend the kitchen units slightly round the corner, but you have thought about this. On BF there is some skepticism about the long term (say 10 year) airtightness of bifolds and people are tending to go for Lift and Slide instead. Switcthing to ome set of French Doors would save several thousand, however. >Rear garden access - this is a bit of a concern of mine - not so much for smaller items, but for during the build, particularly due to the slope. Re. Wheelchairs, we've been advised by our architect that we're passing accessibility regs (we'll see) but i accept its not easy to get someone in a wheelchair up to the living level. We did briefly talk about incorporating a lift (as per a previous comment) but the cost. A couple of comments. To my mind the wheelchair etc issue is not really about tickbox regs, but about your lifestyle and the possibility of your friends who are eg in wheelchairs and yourselves being embarrassed in that situation. Or what happens if you or your partner breaks your back and ends up disabled? In that situation you would not want to be forced to move house. On the lift, I would argue for the *possibility* of incorportating one in future rather than adding 25k to the budget now. That is things like designing your structure so structural beams are not where the hole in the floor would go, putting a more robust element in for the anchor at the top etc, leaving a suitable space on each floor etc. That may not be prohibitive. On the garden access, mitigation is straightforward, but full access is slightly more tricky. 1 - Incorporate a wheelbarrow / bicycle ramp into your side-path stair design. Something like this, which could be sunken as well as proud: (Credit: https://www.yelp.com/biz/vindels-construction-san-diego or this or this (Credit: http://wallswithoutcement.blogspot.co.uk/2006/12/steps-and-wheelbarrow-ramp.html) How you do it depends on your materials and path width and step design, and should cost not too much extra. At its simplest you just mortar in an angled brick upside down to each step, or put a groove in your mini wall at the side. IMO the ramp really wants to be wide enough for a sack trolley, and you want an anchor point for a portable winch at the top. In your setting I might be tempted to finish white concrete mini-side walls in embedded beach pebbles on top so I have a low friction surface for an inclined plane which would just need a board, a cable, and the aforementioned winch. Or put grooves in the top for rails. At its simplest you could incorporate a small depression at the bottom where you wedge a 5m piece of gutter cut to length when you want to use a wheelbarrowm with a couple of stabilising pegs somewhere - which could be a batten to wedge in the path and 2 six inch nails. I would say make the steps as shallow as possible to make barrows easier for smaller people (or it will be delegated to you), and make half landings long enough to fit a bike/barrow and a person who want a rest - say 1.5m. 2 - Make a straightforward path through the house wide enough for whatever - always a good idea when difficult access. Suggest 900mm which is sized for a Type III Mobility Scooter or 800mm which would take a "doorway" sized digger. That depends on your lift to work, and appropriate floor finishes and kitchen layout, but there's no point making it impossible when you do not have to. :-). (You now probably think I am completely mad)

Your reasoning seems good. That is the spitting image of Bernard Cribbin's "Hole in the Ground". Can we hope to see a photograph with an appropriate type of hat on the filled in hole? F

One thing I noted in the detailed wording of the CoP linked above is that it talked about iirc "Access Point" to the plot, which could be interpreted as 'nearest point as the crow flies' (ie access for the woodlarks) or perhaps 'plot access point', which is an ambiguity which may be useable creatively if there is a dispute over inches.

I guess to save money you could go box section corrugated, but I would not be totally sure of that by the sea. Personally I am a sucker for copper.

I think copper or zinc would be really fitting and cool for the roof :-) . Or there are tiles that will work at 20 degrees. Not sure about slate-like tiles. Ferdinand

Presumably "as approved" refers to "this one with changes in the next article"? And presumably "cannot add" means without another Planning App? Is the one that the builder had approved before still live? If so, anything approved on that would be difficult to refuse :-).

Will return to this after errands, but does that PC mean that you have lost all those windows on the West Elevation? Especially the one in the 1st Floor Living space.

Would that be illegal in countries where sockets are allowed in bathrooms?

That one is better because the door is at the front, and electrics are not reachable from inside the shower. There used to be small flats in London with the bath under the worktop in the kitchen iirc. I saw one once on a renovation TV programme. It would probably havave been London County or Peabody or similar. Ferdinand

Much improved :-). My comments on *this* iteration, if I may, to encourage continuation of the novel. Where does the person in 1st Floor back bedroom take their shower ? :-) I stand by my off list argument on those rooms. I bet this is coming in chapter 7, but it doesn't seem to make full use of EW elevations, light and sea views for some rooms. The front entrance is much better resolved, but is that enough dustbin space? We are about to get dustbin number 4. LIke the full length windows, but I would sweat some blood on the precise arrangement. I am not sure about the levels on that stair window. It seems to be that there is more window on the basement stairs than the 1st Floor Stairs, and the floor level vs window relationship on the stairs may be odd ... would need to see a cross section. Or make the stair wall entirely glass. I would say perhaps put a window at 1st floor stair half landing level with a window seat. Nice views from landing, and sparrows and trains. And I am not sure about 2 sets of N facing patio doors from the kitchen. Might be inclined to lose one of those and have a sink facing the back garden through a window rather than the indicated Rudyard Kipling sink ("Watch the Wall My Darling"). How will you get heavy stuff e.g. ton of manure, and friends in wheelchairs, into the back garden and house ?

Now this does look illegal. Sockets too close to shower? Basically it is a badly designed small studio room imo. Interesting that the Standard do not link to the ad.

Think that is easy to fix by a roofer inserting a something something membrane under the bottom 2ft or so. Just had that done on a 40 year old roof. F

Special Protection Area related to the EU Birds Directive. As ever the implementation here seems extremely gold-plated. The theory is that if you build within X kilometres of a sufficiently important population of certain bird species, your new development will prevent them feeding in the area (especially if they are shy birds such as woodlarks). Close to the SPA there is a presumption against development, and further away you are required to buy them alternative feeding grounds. Typically things are not built within 400m of the SPA, and anything proposed within 4 miles or so is difficult and needs to argue and mitigate. It is easier for smaller developments. In the area of this Planning App the mitigation cost is approx £7-8k in the form of a planning payment if you build a 3 bedroom house. The doc for the area of this thread is here: https://www.hart.gov.uk/sites/default/files/4_The_Council/Policies_and_published_documents/Planning_policy/Interim_Avoidance_Strategy_for_TBHSPA - November_2010.pdf If you are potentially affected, you have to have a statement in your Planning App saying that you have thought about it. It can be another tool in the NIMBY toolbox. Ferdinand