Newbie

[Paddocks532]

Hi all. I've been on here a while on and off and posted about 3½ years ago for advice on potential plots. We ended up getting a lovely plot in a nice village in Norfolk not long after that but was held up for 3 years because of neutrient neutrality and natural England stopping all new planning permissions being granted. We got full planning 4 months ago and have made a start, in the winter🫣. Foundation blocks are nearly laid to ground level. Me and my husband with a little help from others are running and building ourselves. My husband's a carpenter and was a site/contracts manager for a building company. We are building a single storey timber frame home with a brick skin up to window height then black cladding. A slightly unusual roof will top it off. We're both really excited and frightened especially regarding budget. We will have to stop the build throughout to earn more money to finish it but will be determined to get there in the end. If anyone has any words of wisdom or suggestions regarding internal layout we'd welcome your input. Also we're stuck with our heating and hot water system in terms of best and most efficient way to do it. It will just be 2 adults+a dog living in the house. We have no gas here and don't want oil so will be all electric. We'd love to have solar and batteries one day but it'll have to wait a while. The back of the house is south facing so will need to organise some shading but again budget may determine what we have. 

Thank you all in advance and I look forward to being part of your amazing community

 

 

[markc]

Hi and welcome

[Gone West]

Welcome to the forum. Nice looking property. Are you happy to have your names and address on the drawings or would you like to cover them.

[Paddocks532]

Thanks gone West. Probably best to cover them if I can figure out how🤔😂

[Paddocks532]

I forgot to mention we're having mvhr as well so ignore the architects spec on extractor fans.

[Tony L]

4 hours ago, Paddocks532 said:

Probably best to cover them if I can figure out how🤔😂

 

If you're lucky, one of the mods will do it for you.

 

This looks really nice & I look forward to hearing more as the work progresses.  I'd cut back on some of that glass.  I'm guessing you have lovely views to the south, so all those windows will stay, but I'd say you should consider deleting some of the windows down the long sides & making some of the windows that are retained smaller.  It will make your house cheaper to build & cheaper to heat/cool.

 

I'm envious of your integral garage.

[ETC]

Looks great. Really simple plan and elevations.

[-rick-]

Welcome! Overall looks like a nice plan.

 

I am curious what's driving decision to dedicate so much of the space to the master dressing room? I would have thought a smaller dresser and a 3rd bed/office would be a better use of space (and more saleable if circumstances change). Alternatively, a layout that allowed some of the dresser to be made into that extra room without significant rework. I assume you wouldn't have got this far into the design without serious thought into this so really curious to hear your thought process.

[DownSouth]

20 minutes ago, -rick- said:

I am curious what's driving decision to dedicate so much of the space to the master dressing room? 

Welcome.

 

+1 What’s the rationale for having a 2 bed when you have the footprint for 3? Do you have loads of clothes? To future proof could you move the en-suite next to the bedroom and dressing room to where the en-suite is? Then you could have a door to the corridor that’s locked until it might be needed. Appreciate pipes/drainage will shift but it would give more flex later. Also imho en-suites are better if they are close if you need to get up in the night. It’s quite a walk as laid out. 
Could be an easy change - i think you can shift internal layout without reverting back to planning but might need amendments if you change externals/window positions. Someone please correct if that’s not the case.

[Iceverge]

Welcome to the forum.

 

Congrats on a nice house. 

 

Tell me more about the construction method planned?

 

I would certainly avoid any PIR in between the studs of a timber frame in any case. Blown cellulose gets my vote instead. 

[Wilksy]

Hi and welcome. Your project looks great. 

[Paddocks532]

On 06/01/2026 at 21:09, Tony L said:

 

If you're lucky, one of the mods will do it for you.

 

This looks really nice & I look forward to hearing more as the work progresses.  I'd cut back on some of that glass.  I'm guessing you have lovely views to the south, so all those windows will stay, but I'd say you should consider deleting some of the windows down the long sides & making some of the windows that are retained smaller.  It will make your house cheaper to build & cheaper to heat/cool.

 

I'm envious of your integral garage.

Thank you Tony L. I'll look forward to sharing with you all. Cut back on windows/ sizes 😥 ok we'll have a look. The garage will be a workshop🤫😂 planners wouldn't let it be a workshop cause of possible noise so we have to have it as a garage 🙄 my husband's one wish is a workshop. 

[Paddocks532]

On 06/01/2026 at 21:46, -rick- said:

Welcome! Overall looks like a nice plan.

 

I am curious what's driving decision to dedicate so much of the space to the master dressing room? I would have thought a smaller dresser and a 3rd bed/office would be a better use of space (and more saleable if circumstances change). Alternatively, a layout that allowed some of the dresser to be made into that extra room without significant rework. I assume you wouldn't have got this far into the design without serious thought into this so really curious to hear your thought process.

🤣 Well our dressing is huge because: 

We have a lot of clothes and shoes

We hate folding clothes in drawers

We have very little storage space and no loft in the house

There will be no other storage in bedroom.

Have I justified it🫣🤣

We've already decided we are putting a door into the dressing room from the hall and might be making the ensuite a little wider but shorter to make the sitting cupboard a bigger to accommodate a water tank and ufh manifold

[Paddocks532]

On 06/01/2026 at 22:18, DownSouth said:

Welcome.

 

+1 What’s the rationale for having a 2 bed when you have the footprint for 3? Do you have loads of clothes? To future proof could you move the en-suite next to the bedroom and dressing room to where the en-suite is? Then you could have a door to the corridor that’s locked until it might be needed. Appreciate pipes/drainage will shift but it would give more flex later. Also imho en-suites are better if they are close if you need to get up in the night. It’s quite a walk as laid out. 
Could be an easy change - i think you can shift internal layout without reverting back to planning but might need amendments if you change externals/window positions. Someone please correct if that’s not the case.

Thank you downsouth. Excellent suggestion. But I am a really light sleeper and my husband gets up way before me in the morning and is not quiet when he gets up 🙄😂. So I'm ok with the ensuite being a little further away. I'm the one that gets up in the night for the toilet so my husband isn't bothered it's a little further away. And yes it makes it easier for plumbing 😁

[Paddocks532]

On 07/01/2026 at 05:44, Iceverge said:

Welcome to the forum.

 

Congrats on a nice house. 

 

Tell me more about the construction method planned?

 

I would certainly avoid any PIR in between the studs of a timber frame in any case. Blown cellulose gets my vote instead. 

Hi Iceverge. Thanks for your reply. We will have 150ml kingspan thermo floor tf70 and a 150ml polished concrete slab as finished floor +membranes etc the walls will be, 20ml treated cladding stained black, laid horizontally.

- 25 x 38mm treated softwood timber battens. - Dupoint Tyvek Housewrap, or similar approved.

- 9mm Sheathing ply.

- 140mm thick timber frame with 120mm Kingspan K112 insulation board + 48ml tharmaline super insulated plasterboard

Roof: red/orange mix clay pantiles, membrane, 50ml air gap, 100ml kingspan, 65ml insulated plasterboard. Can I ask why blown cellulose. I don't know much about it. Thanks

[Iceverge]

The kingspan salesman gets another trip to Tenerife. 🥺

 

I'm guessing the spec for the insulation came from your architect? Who i expect in turn copied and pasted it directly out of the Kingspan book of details that "someone" dropped on their desk. 

 

Before committing to this I very much suggest you have a look at some other methods that will be easier to build, much cheaper, and perform better. 

 

My suggestion would be something like this. Better still ditch the mineral wool and use blown cellulose fibers. 

 

[G and J]

@Paddocks532 @Iceverge our architect obviously had the same kingspan salesman!

 

We decided to move away from pir (converted to mineral wool) as having read (copiously) here on BH we realised why a room we had built in the roof over the garage felt "dead", bit echoy. Was plenty warm enough but just not quite right, all this without even getting into the issues of pir being horrible to work with and more difficult to ensure a tight fit. So far so good.