Background

Lorien and I have been planning on building our own home for the better part of a year. We have gone through well more than a dozen basic floor plans as we vacillate between dreams and pragmatism. I would like to take this opportunity to give a bit of background of how we got started and to explain some of the concepts we are considering. We would greatly appreciate any comments and criticisms you may have; it would certainly be better to have them now rather than after the walls are painted.

The first, an possibly most influential, book I came across in thinking about building our home is "Living Homes" by Thomas Elpel. Thomas and his wife built their dream home in Montana with seemingly heroic personal efforts and limited funds. The book not only outlines the various building concepts the couple employed but also goes to great lengths to explain alternatives and the rationale of their choices. Those of you who know me well will have no trouble imagining how much I wanted to emulate this young couple... living in a tent at the job site in the wilderness forging ahead with my unbridled enthusiasm. It is probably best that I could not start building the day after I finished this book for while it gave us many great ideas there were a whole host of considerations yet to be addressed. Possibly the greatest asset that we gleaned from this book was the host of new resources to consider; that and the more pragmatic side of home construction rather than just wanting a castle in the mountains.

Goals and key ideas:

From reading nearly two dozen home building books and a degree in engineering (albeit not focused on home construction) we have come up with a number of tenets for our home construction. The most influential of these is that the house is a system to be considered not only as a sum of parts but also as a whole. Like all homeowners we of course care about the form of the building; the architecture, the landscape, and the site are all serious considerations. Our goal is to address all of these while building a technically and mechanically sound sustainable home.

Sustainability is a word that is tossed around a lot today. I have been fortunate to be surrounded by many brilliant people who are working towards a more sustainable future in a broad spectrum of fields. What has become increasingly apparent to me in the last few years is that there are often no completely right answers when it comes to sustainability. A truly superior option very rarely exists, if it did we would all likely be doing it already and there would be little cause for debate. What is widely agreed upon is that increased efficiency and reduced material and energy usage are essential first steps. With these ideas in mind Lorien and I are looking to create a warm, comfortable home that minimizes energy usage and lasts well beyond our lifetime.

Ideas we are considering employing include but are not limited to...

Passive solar design (carefully calculated solar orientation, thermal mass, window glazing etc.)

Super-insulation

Open floor plan with strategically place windows and venting to allow natural convection to thermally regulate the interior of the house.

Masonry heater for primary heat generation

Timber frame construction from sustainable timber

Structural Insulated Panels (SIPs) for use in both the walls and the roof of the structure

Active solar thermal for hot water and possibly hydronic heating

Active solar for electricity (insolation is not spectacular, slightly below Minneapolis on average)

Wind for electricity (wind resource is more substantial than solar, particularly since we will be on the top of a 1000' above sea level hill, however, the NIMBY consideration may be significant)

Composting toilets (this idea is currently looking highly improbable due to potential resale difficulties)

Gray water mitigation

Attached greenhouse, for decoration, passive solar gain and minimal food production

Please feel free to ask me about any of these ideas or anything that I may have forgotten to list. I will be putting up a list of links and resources as soon as I can.


Many of you may be wondering exactly how we plan to go about building this home. As we haven't actually begun construction the ideas are still skirling about and we are not certain of all of the details just yet. The final decision may come from financing options. The only bank we've spoken to so far has no qualms about financing an owner-builder, however, they want the construction complete in 12 months, 15 at the longest. Lorien and I are both healthily skeptical that I could do all that I want to and complete the house in this amount of time (that being said neither of us has ever built a house and we have no idea how long it will actually take.) The basic plan thus far is....

I will clear the trees and scrub from the future road site and the house site (the road is likely to be about 800'.) We have spoken to a construction company about having them lay the road, grade the site and pour the foundation, likely next spring or early summer. We will hire a timber frame company to build the timber frame. We will sheath the house in SIPs either ourselves or will hire out depending on a the timber framing company and a few other considerations. We will hire out the roofing and eventually the drywall. I have spoken to a masonry company about constructing the masonry heater and I will hopefully aid in that construction but will not be in charge of it. I am planning on doing the rest of the construction myself with whatever help arises (extra hands are always welcome.) I am still in debate about whether to do my own electrical and plumbing work. I have received stout advice for and against both by highly competent people and the verdict is still out.

A few words about stone...

After reading Thomas Elpel's book I read a handful of other books about working with stone written for owner-builders (those who build their own home.) After three or four of these books I believe I got a decent handle on the pros and cons of building with stone and I think we will probably not construct a stone castle.

Pros:
If you live in a rocky area, the material can be very cheap if not free.
Buildings made of stone are supreme when it comes to longevity.
Stone provides fantastic thermal mass and when insulated properly is a great thermal attenuator.
Stone can provide a level of beauty and craftsmanship to make a home truly unique.

Cons:
As you may imagine... stone is heavy.
Compared to other structural materials it is very time consuming.
Stone is a very poor thermal insulator, thick exterior stone walls alone are nowhere near sufficient in northern climes.

All of that being said we are purchasing a piece of property that is heavily wooded and highly rocky. We will not be without ample stone. We currently intend to use stone as an element in our masonry heater (more to come on that later), as a feature in our greenhouse and hopefully as a design accent in the interior of the house.

Preliminary floor plans and site pictures are in the works.

Circle zero... square one yet to come

Well we don't actually own land to build on yet so this first bit will just be about where we are staying in the mean time and a few pictures of that. Lorien, Tesla, Ryu, Kaiya and I have been living in our rental for about two months now. Our stuff is unpacked, we've made a few new friends and have thus far not acquired any new animals.





5am sunrise from our back porch














and our living room as it is just now.








Blogger appears to be cranky with me for trying to load photos so I'll have to call it quits for now and come back with more in episode two.


Cheers,
Ross