The Project
Martin Pease is a successful commercial architect, used to designing large scale prestigious offices. However, he's about to embark on a much more personal project - a home for his wife Katherine and their two lively children.
The design he has come up with is not the obvious choice for a family - a giant sugar cube where everything in it is white and open plan. Even the master bedroom sits on a mezzanine above the huge living space. Determined to keep on schedule and budget, Martin uses his experience of designing commercial buildings to build his own home.
Martin plans to use materials and systems more commonly seen in office builds. Everything is thought through, pared down, and designed to maximise efficiency.
This build though, is not without its dangers. It's a high concept design and difficult to pull off. The detailing and design has to be perfect because there's nowhere to hide mistakes. But the biggest risk of all is that by using all these commercial techniques and materials, Martin's dream could end up looking more like a glamorous car showroom than a comfortable family home.
Budget And Build
Land cost: £425,000
Estimated Budget: £350,000
Final Budget: £350,000
Never before has Grand Designs witnessed such a meticulously planned project, and the fact that the house came in bang on budget is testament to Martin and Katherine's project management expertise.
No project can be perfect, but our Bristol Grand Designers were far-sighted enough to have planned in a generous contingency to cover unforeseen hiccups, such as the £13,000 task of moving an old sewer found during groundwork excavation.
Part of the project's success was having a good builder capable of juggling various subcontractors throughout this potentially complicated build. But the real secret to its aesthetic and financial success has been identified by the project's joint architect/owner/project manager. Martin has this advice to offer: 'Come up with what you think you want and stick to it. Do not be tempted to change it half way through because that might seem like an easy decision to make at the time but you'll rue the day you did it because you'll just have a whole cascade of sequences which will undo right in front of you.'
Wise words from a man who knows a thing or two about a successful building project...
The front of this super insulated timber box is a stark white wall perforated with deep cut windows which jetty out to cheat extra upstairs space. But the building's hidden coup-de-gras is at the back. One huge wall of glass connects the interior with the garden.
The ground floor is open plan and half of it double height. Almost everything outside and in is white, including the totally minimal kitchen. Only the free-standing living room wall offers any relief. Clad in slate, it also cantilevers the apparently weightless staircase. Behind it is a family snug, play room and utility room. Up the floating stairs is a first floor gallery running the full length of the open space.
Behind this gallery there are three white bedrooms, each with its own ensuite. The bedrooms are walled in glass so that they connect to the outside world, but at the flick of a switch these glass walls become opaque.
At the end of the gallery is the master bedroom, which is unusually open to the downstairs living space, separated only by a glass balcony. The idea of an open plan polished white home seems rather odd for a family with two lively children and two cheeky dogs.
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Want to be a self-build guru? Then read on....
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