Tag: building a house

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Leaving for a new life

I’m in my last three weeks at work now before leaving corporate life forever. Even writing that down feels incredibly final after thirty plus years of working!

It’s a bitter-sweet feeling. I’ve worked as an IT Director/CIO for twenty years now, and have never done anything else other than technology and change.

I’ve been privileged to work for some amazing companies during this time.

What’s kept me going all this time has been working within creative media companies, music and book publishing especially, over the last fifteen years. When you love the product that your company produces, and you’re working with like-minded people, it’s easy to stay motivated. Music, art and books have always been my passion.

Having said that, it’s time to hang up the business suit. Metaphorically speaking – it’s a very long time since I actually wore a business suit 😊.

Increasingly over the last ten years I’ve felt a growing sense of weariness with the battle for technology to be recognised as core to company strategy, with long commutes and with long working hours. Husband feels the same. It’s eroding our sanity and increasingly feels empty of worth beyond the paycheck, however necessary that paycheck has been.

We’ve both decided to stop. I’m not going to use the word retirement, but it’s time for us to move to the next phase of our lives. I suspect that the next five years are going to be harder work than either of us have ever experienced, but we both relish the challenge.

For us it’s about a simpler life. Getting off the treadmill and doing something for ourselves. We will be much poorer in monetary terms, that’s a racing certainty, but we’ll be richer in other, more important ways. And we both feel the need for that so strongly.

Building our forever home is going to be hard. We’ll make mistakes, and our bodies aren’t used to daily physical labour. There’s going to be a lot of pain and frustration. But we think that the satisfaction of one day being able to sit in front of the log burner looking out at the view through our big windows over the Sound of Sleat and be able to say “we did this” is something worth striving for.

Nature and the land are also extremely important to us. The island is a beautiful place and we believe that planting trees can only enhance that for both local wildlife and our ourselves. This will be a legacy that we won’t perhaps see to its full maturity, but that which we hope the next generation will reap the benefits of.

We hope someone after us will love the little six acre patch of croft that we will create as much as we will. With its orchards, nut trees, willow beds, rowans, hawthorns and birch groves it will be a special place.

The other thing that I am so looking forward to is growing some of our own food. We’ll have vegetable beds, herb beds and berry beds. We will plant apple and hazelnut trees.

We’ll grow mushrooms on beech logs and keep chickens for their eggs. I will have the time to bake bread and to cook with what we grow and raise.

As well as this, I’m looking forward to spending time exploring my creative side, something that has been suppressed for most of my adult life. We’ve reserved one of the rooms in the house as a small studio for me to create in. I think that being surrounded by so much natural beauty will re-kindle my desire to create again. Whether that’s in clay, on canvas or in textiles I don’t yet know, but I can feel it there, quietly simmering under the surface of my respectability and exhaustion.

These last few months in London are a time of packing, planning and reflection, and of nervousness and anticipation at the magnitude of the change that we’re undertaking.

There’s much uncertainty in the coming years for all of us, but I do know that this is the right thing for us to do.

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Curbing instincts

Knowing that we’ll soon be moving into the static, which has a tiny kitchen with very little storage space, means that I’m having to curb my tendency to stash food for emergencies such as the next zombie invasion or pandemic.

The current Covid-19 situation has only reinforced what I recognise is deep-set behaviour to store for bad times.

Every time I see a 10kg sack of basmati rice or puy lentils on sale I have to physically restrain myself from buying them. The instinct to stock up is strong, but there’s no logic in more dried goods sitting in storage with the furniture for six months whilst we complete the build.

There simply isn’t anywhere to put them.

I grit my teeth and tell myself that there will be the chance to fully stack that pantry once it’s built and ready to take supplies. And not a moment sooner.

I think I’m on the spectrum somewhere (aren’t we all in some way, I guess?) but it gives me great satisfaction to list what the pantry will eventually hold. I haven’t confessed to husband yet, but I’ve got LISTS of proposed purchases.

I’ve been looking at labelling systems, storage jars and boxes, and what shelving we’ll need…😂

It maybe the smallest room in the house, but I’m planning to make every inch of the storage work, and I can’t wait to add homemade jams, pickles and cordials to the stash next summer to see us through those long, dark, wet Scottish winters.

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Slates

A dreich day, with constant drizzle. A friend on the island visited site to take pictures of more progress for us.

The slates are being laid.

Loving the texture of these.

The windows are also now in place.

Can’t help thinking how good this would look in black – not a look that we’d seriously considered previously.

The only challenge with a black or grey stain is that it needs maintenance every few years, and probably reapplication to keep looking good. Natural Siberian larch is left untreated and it greys naturally over the years, needing nothing further. The wood hardens in reaction to the atmosphere and weather and protects itself.

It will be ready for its larch cladding in a few weeks time and we’ll see how its weatherproof wooden coat looks “au naturele” then.

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The joy of posi joists

When the photos arrived last week from the site, one of the things that most struck me as a building novice was our joists.

I had never seen joists like this before. To be honest, I’d never given joists much thought. Thankfully our architects had!

A few minutes research online confirmed that these were web or posi joists, and that they’ve been around for a while.

Hugely strong with a steel web reinforcing the timber struts, they enable long spans of floor to be constructed without structural reinforcement such as load bearing walls, and their open nature allows easy installation of services, like MVHR.

MVHR (Mechanical Ventilation and Heat Recovery) systems are a very effective way to reduce the heat energy used in thermally efficient homes. We will be installing MVHR and these joists enable the ducts to be run through the construction very easily.

There is also less movement in these joists than with traditional timber, meaning more solidity to floors, less creaking and better sound insulation.

The more I read about these joists the more I realise that these were a great inclusion, and yet another element of the build that I’ve been quietly impressed with.

This may look like a traditional island house from the outside once it’s clad in larch and its roof has been slated, but its bones will be made up from the latest technologies in building innovation, making this a warm, strong, energy efficient construction which I hope will benefit us for many years to come.

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The Weaving

When we started on this journey I wanted to somehow commemorate the move to the island and build of our forever home.

I wanted to find a medium that was unique and significant to us in some way. Both husband and I love art, and I especially love textiles, so we decided to combine these two loves into the idea of a weaving.

Personally, my emotional response to the island has always been to do with its light, colours and textures.

The ever changing skies over the island exhibit colours that range from deep, brooding greys to clear, intense blues.

There is the translucent, steel-grey of the sea which changes to patches of iridescent aquamarine in the shallower waters.

And on the land, the textures of sand and pebbles on the local beaches and the ancient, speckled, rain-smoothed granite poking through the reeds on the croft.

I’ll create my own art in response to all of this one day, that’s something I’m quite sure of. I’m just not ready yet.

In the meantime, I’ve found a talented young weaver called Christy Balfour and I’ve commissioned her to weave us a piece for our new home.

It’s in a mixture of different weight wools and linens, texturally varied and interesting and in washed-out greys, sables, greens and aquas – sky, croft and sea colours.

It’s Christy’s own design, and quite abstract. It’s being woven now and should be ready in a few more months.

It will be the first piece of art that we mount on the walls next year, and having seen the plans and the early samples above, I think it’s going to be amazing.

Young artists find it incredibly tough to live on the proceeds of their work so I’m so pleased that we’ve been able to do this, especially during lockdown when things must have been especially challenging for small businesses.

And we will have a piece of work that has been created in direct response to our feelings about the island.

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Three days in…and we have walls!

It’s remarkable how quickly the house now starts to take shape. This is progress three days in since the first panel was lifted into place, and although there’s much to do, they’re fairly cracking on with this.

All of the exterior panels are up, the beams are in and a waterproof membrane has been applied to protect the panels from the elements.

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New beginnings

It’s lovely to see my two stepsons so excited about the next step in their lives. At 20 and 22 they’re both moving out of home this summer and have decided to take a flat together in Manchester.

They were up early yesterday looking at flats and planning next steps over mugs of tea in the kitchen.

I love that they can share living space and support each other whilst they finish university and find new work.

This has come at a good time for both of us. We’re in the process of downsizing possessions and packing up for the island, and many of the household things that we would have otherwise stored or sold can be passed on to them for their new flat, which will save them money.

It also means that the journey up to the Isle of Skye for visits is about four hours shorter than from London, which is a real bonus.

Whether the attraction of our remote cold, wet island and their wild-haired, welly-clad old folks will be enough to tempt them up to see us after the excitement of city living is entirely another matter! I hope so.

As I hope that the tranquility of our croft and the different pace of life there will provide a welcome haven for them from the madness of modern city dwelling whenever they need it.

New lives and new beginnings for all of us.

This is what life is all about.

❤️

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SIP panels going up

The SIP panels were delivered to site today and are starting to go up…

It looks a bit like a dolls house being built at this stage, although these panels are massively strong and well insulated.

Suddenly the house looks tiny…

When we looked into house build construction methods back at the design stage, we decided on SIP (structured insulated panels) for a number of reasons.

  • Speed of Construction
    Building with SIPs is a fast construction method. It is entirely possible for the SIP house ‘shell’ to be completed within seven days.     Ours will take 2-3 weeks, we think. Useful on a rainy island.
     
  • Environmental credentials
    SIP-built houses are highly energy efficient, with the result that they are easier to heat. This means less harmful CO    2 released into the atmosphere. Very little energy is used during the SIP manufacturing process, with SIPs using up to 50% less raw timber compared with conventional timber frame houses. We like that.
     
  • Sound Proofing
    SIP panels have excellent sound absorption properties with the result that the finished buildings are quieter to live in.     After years of living in flimsy walled modern flats and houses with sound systems, guitar practice and video calls all going at once, this is a definite advantage!
     
  • Structural Strength
    SIP walls can be up to seven times stronger than conventional timber frame.     The strength of SIP structures allows for thinner walls and no bulky roof trusses.
     
  • Thermal Performance
    Insulation is integral to the SIP system, and therefore doesn’t require installation at a later date. The superior thermal performance of a SIP structure will last the lifespan of the building, thanks to the solid core of insulation throughout the structure. This means that the building is heated evenly, is free from cold spots and benefits from reduced heating costs.
     

I guess the proof of the pudding, as they say, is in the eating… 😊

Only time will tell, but we have high hopes!

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Dribbles from the island

Updates dribble in slowly from the builders like the intermittent drip from a tap.

Not known as the most patient of people, I await them anxiously, counting the days and weeks since the last email. It’s tough being remote from a build project when it’s your very future going up one block at a time.

Updates do come though – not every week, and not always with accompanying photos, but progress is definitely being made.

I believe that the concrete has been poured onto the foundation slab and that the builders are ready to start erecting the SIP panels next week. They’ve advised that the panels normally take about three weeks to complete.

After that the roof slates go on, then the larch cladding for the walls. By the time we visit in September we’ll definitely have the semblance of a house to see, even if it’s just the exterior shell.

It’s going to be an emotional moment.

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Taking Shape

It’s taking shape, and the builders have been working hard to move this on whilst the weather holds.

It looks as if the sewerage treatment plant is starting to go in, and the outlet pipe is being connected. This will discharge clean, treated water via an outfall into the burn at the back of the house.

Let’s hope that the water and electricity connections will be confirmed soon, as we won’t be able to progress beyond the summer without them.

It’s so good to see the house starting to emerge from the land. This is the first time that I’ve really been able to visualise it properly in it’s setting, and I think it’s going to sit well….