Photos of the lot
Posted on | September 1, 2008 | 2 Comments
Yesterday, we took a trip out to the lot to think about siting the house. As expected, this is going to be a very difficult decision. We walked up on the ridge and had a look around. Even from ground level on the ridge, you can see the lake. From a second floor perspective, the view would be amazing. It’s too bad that it is so close to the neighbour’s house.
From further back on the lot, in the lower position, I don’t think you’d see the lake, even from the second floor, but probably from the third floor.
One of the main reasons we bought the lot was the potential for a view of the lake. Now that we’re considering moving the house down lower, it feels different to me. The ridge is where my heart wants to put the house, the lower post is where my head says to put it. I think once we get to the next stage, we’ll want to get the architect out to walk it with us again.
Here are a few photos to give you a sense of what the lot looks like.
The view from the ridge at ground level (first floor) Seven months of the year, we would have a great view of the lake.
Looking up onto the ridge from a clearing in the lot.
Survey line looking towards the road on the right side of the lot.
Survey line looking backwards. See how close the neighbour's house is?
The lower part of the lot. Lots of young birches here.
Some of the geological features of the lot--lots of HUGE boulders.
The left side survey line viewed from the road.
The road frontage. A very interesting mix of trees. Behind the car is where the driveway will likely go in.
Where should we put the house on the lot?
Posted on | August 30, 2008 | 2 Comments
Lot Survey
This is a huge issue for us. When we bought the lot, we had every intention of building the house up on top of the ridge to the right, assuming that we had more than enough space to do so. As it turns out from the survey, we own the entire ridge, so it looks like we’ve got more than enough space to site the house up there. This has some enormous positives, For one thing, putting the house up on the ridge all but guarantees lake views from the second and third floors, and perhaps even the first floor when there are no leaves on the trees. It also provides better access to true south for passive solar gain.
There are several potential issues with putting the house up on the hill though. For one thing, the hill appears to be made almost entirely of granite boulders, so any excavation on it would be very costly, and we’ll need a nice level platform for the engineered slab. I can picture quite a bit of blasting being required, and the second you break out the dynamite, you’re in for a whole host of other costs, environmental issues (such as potential contamination of the neighbour’s well) and the ridge is quite close to the neighbour’s house too, which could mean broken windows if anything goes wrong. The other problem with being up on the ridge is that we would be very close to the house next door. Since we really value our privacy, this is something of an issue for us. The other issue is that we don’t intend to take the driveway up onto the ridge since it’s quite steep and I’d rather not deal with that in the winter. So, that means that when we get old, we’d need to negotiate a set of stairs just to get into the house. Although this isn’t a huge concern now (after all, there could be jetpacks available in 30 years!), it’s still something we’re thinking about.
Monica presented another alternative for locating the house, and it’s one that we hadn’t really considered. It would position the house further back on the lot, more in the middle of the property. It’s still about 10-15 feet higher elevation than the road, but it wouldn’t put us up nearly as high–although the current house plan would allow the kids to see the lake from the third floor.
House location further back on the lot
This location has some great positives too. It would be easier to add a garage/addition someday, it’s still private with all the trees, would require limited excavation and it would allow us to keep some of the more mature trees at the front of the lot. One of the only negatives is that the driveway might need to be longer, but at least it’s pretty flat in through there.
What do you think? Where would you want to be? Up high in the sky, or nestled down in the trees? Of course, the location of the septic may determine some of this, but it won’t affect everything.
Passive Solar House Design
Posted on | August 28, 2008 | 5 Comments
If you want to build a passive solar home in Nova Scotia, chances are you’ve heard of Don Roscoe. He is a past (or maybe even present, it’s hard to tell from their website) officer of Solar Nova Scotia, and teaches a solar design course, that my wife and I intend to take this fall. Our friends in Three Brooks have a Don Roscoe home and it’s positively incredible. You can see photos of it in the gallery of the Solar NS site (this is a direct link).
Don Roscoe passive solar home
The design of the home is modern, slightly eclectic and indicative of Don’s style. The basic theory of a passive solar home is thus:
- By positioning a wall of windows facing true south, you can collect heat from the winter sun
- This heat is captured by the engineered concrete slab floor
- You can also circulate this warm air via ducting in the floor
- Some passive solar homes collect the warm air as it rises to the ceiling and recirculate it back down to the slab, thereby increasing the duration of warmth
- This method of heating is sufficient for all but the coldest of days, in which case you’ll want a secondary heat source. The house above has a wood-burning appliance/stove. With only a couple cords of wood per year, the house stays warm and cosy. Obviously, this means that heating costs are very low, and wood is a renewable resource, so it’s a win-win. Sure, wood may not be the cleanest burning fuel, but it’s better than using electric and supporting the coal plants Nova Scotia Power uses to create electricity in this province.
We recently purchased a book called Passive Solar House: The Complete Guide to Heating and Cooling Your Home. In this book are numerous tips and trick for taking full advantage of the sun as a heating and cooling mechanism. There are also formulas for calculating appropriate amounts of glazing, vs depth of concrete floor, and amount of shading required to take advantage of the winter sun, yet not overheat in the summer. If you looked at the Third Design, you’ll see the use of an overhang to shade the left and right windows and a trellis type thing to shade the core windows.
When we first decided to buy the lot, we called quite a few people for advice. Knowing how much we liked Roscoe’s solar homes, we called him first. We were actually quite surprised by the reception we got from him. As it turns out, he doesn’t want our business. He is only interested in working for people who are planning to live in their home forever and are planning to design it for eventual one floor living (we are). His workers are apparently very delicate people who perform well only when presented with gifts and frequent days off to enjoy the sun (say what?). Throughout the 40 minute conversation with my wife, Don was rude, conceited and clearly disinterested in ever working with us. From talking with other people, apparently, that’s just how he is, until he gets to know you and deigns to take on your project, and only then if it strikes his fancy.
I don’t understand that. If you are good at your job, and you know it, by all means take pride in your work and feel comfort in the stability that notoriety provides. But why treat people badly just so that you only have to take on the single project a year that appeals to you? Just tell us up-front that you are very choosy about what you work on, we’re grownups, we can deal with it!
We’re very happy to be working with a designer who ‘gets’ passive solar design and doesn’t wear their ego on their sleeve, despite having phenomenal abilities. I expect that throughout the course of this project we’ll come to meet plenty of super cool people who love what they do and are enjoyable to work with. I also expect to meet lots of people who are the exact opposite. I intend to fully disclose absolutely every detail of these meetings, the prices on the quotes (when possible) and our impression of our contractors. Isn’t blogging all about being honest?
The Official Three Brooks Welcoming Committee
Posted on | August 25, 2008 | 3 Comments
Our friends who suggested we buy the lot joined us on it for champagne to toast our ‘arrival’ in the neighbourhood. These are a few pictures from that occasion. I can already tell that we’ll love it here.
Here you can see the enormous glacier-deposited boulders that populate our property. A key selling feature for sure.
Me passing out sparkling wine for the adults and apple juice for the kids.
Our kids hanging out in one of the nice Aspen trees. There are a dozen of these at the front of the property.
Me, my son Kiernan in the backpack, daughter Amelia hanging in the tree, and my wife Sam holding our daughter Imogen.