Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Monday, June 29, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
Lot Clearing
Jeff and Tom are clearing the back of the lot today so that the excavators have access next week. I'm here testing this Blog app.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Built-Ins
One of the more fun parts of working with a design builder is that the same guy who is building the general structure will also be doing the custom details on the interior. Built-ins, like shelves or desktops (of which we will have plenty), are a trademark of houses that Jeff builds. We have a few custom built-in ideas to challenge Jeff. Don't feel sorry for him either. This kind of work excites him.
To best communicate our ideas to Jeff, Lisa and I design the projects in InDesign. (See above) We did that for two projects this week:
1. The master bedroom bed wall: The idea is that the bed will fit into an alcove. This will be built with drywall. Inside the alcove there will be cubbies on both sides of the bed, equipped with outlets, speakers and light switches for reading lights. To fill the dead space in the drywall pillars, we're adding shelving on both sides.
2. The downstairs bookshelf and platform lounge: The middle of the downstairs is wide open space. We've already come to grips with the fact that it will be the playroom for this season of life. The platform style lounge is a place to read with our kids, around which, staggered bookshelves will store toys, books, and decor. One of the larger shelf openings will house a fixed horizontal window.
Lock and Load
The subject of Jeff's email last night read "Lock and Load." We got the permits to move forward on the house.
The first domino has fallen... The back of our lot will be cleared this week. Excavation will start next week. The concrete slab and footers for the Superior Walls will go in the following week. And probably the week after that, the Superior Walls will be installed. Most of our special-order materials will be arriving in July, including trusses, windows and siding.
Since our last post, we found out that our address is going to be 931 Belmont Avenue. Good number, isn't? Deserved of some big numbers on the front of the house, I think.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Cladding, Windows and Doors
We picked our exterior cladding: Iron Gray Hardie Panels with a Certainteed cement composite cedar lap.
We found the best value in windows: Pella's Pro Series. We are using all awning and casement style black aluminum clad windows. There are no frames, just all open glass.
There is a great web site that sells window inserts for exterior doors: Crestviewdoors.com. It is an extremely inexpensive way to have a unique front door. You are able to arrange the inserts to create the look of a mid-century door. Check out http://www.crestviewdoors.com/index.php/diy-kits/the-ledgestone-doorlite-kit.
Still Waiting
We submitted our plans to the city over two weeks ago and have not heard a response. We think its because they discovered our neighbor Brad's gas line just beneath our property. Jeff assures me that this is an easy fix, its just a matter of when the city brings guys out to fix it.
As soon as we do get our permits, excavation will start. We think this will start as soon as the week of June 22. Framing would follow shortly after.
We met with Jeff and Joey last night to walk through the details of the contract. We also had a last minute tweak to the master bedroom layout. I'm attaching a detail of that above. Our original bedroom had too much "same" space. The bathroom and closet were on the small side, too. Our goal was to create "different" space and enlarge the closet and bathroom. We accomplished this by moving the master bathroom to the middle of the house and elongating the existing closet. We're excited about the desk space on the other side of the closet. That will be a place to charge laptops, phone and papers.
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