Can you just get an opinion from architect but do most design yourself
oscarhenrietta
7 years ago
Featured Answer
Sort by:Oldest
Comments (8)
Artique Design Group
7 years agoRelated Discussions
What do you enjoy most about your garden?
Comments (8)@midesign0401, Hi Megan, yes it is heaven, I take a look at it all and sigh in happiness!!! As for the house, there's a bit of money to go ahead but this is now our busy time of the year, as we are hay contractors spending many many hours in tractors. However, I intend to get onto the next job ASAP which is laying the sill tiles around the veranda. It's a bit of an old fashioned look but these tiles will protect our limestone bricks from water stain when it's raining constantly in winter. The water will run off the sill tile and drop just a little shy of the bricks. Limestone is not only rough in our case but very porous and we also plan to have these tiles on all the window sills too, like the old tan brick houses from the 50's and the chocolate brown sill they had on their windows,only ours are cream not chocolate. It will be easy to wipe the sills from time to time and keep the house neat and clean. Once these tiles ar in place, 80mtrs of tiles, then we can concrete the veranda and then the roof iron can go on hopefully before Christmas. We have all the bricks for the home but need to find another $16,000 for all the rest of the windows. We are only using our own income, not borrowing at all so we have to do a budget and see if we can allow the money for the windows as the income we earn from Sept to Dec, is about 90% of our income for the entire year. It's taken 7 years now to get to this point having spent more that $80,000 already as I'm keeping a diary of spending. Goodness knows how much a 30+ square home with pool would cost if we had to pay a builder!!! We are owner builders and we've done everything ourselves including digging all the foundation and laying over 5000 standard bricks and digging the hole for the pool and fitting the pool including all the plumbing. We put in all the concrete stumps, layed the floor and fitted all the underfloor plumbing with a plumber friend guiding us along. We also put up all the framing and roof trusses, so we are absolutely chuffed with our abilities and progress....See MoreWhat do you like most about this space?
Comments (28)I love the option to work in a private office while still feeling connected to the larger open plan space. And who doesn't want a huge blackboard to creatively brainstorm?...See MoreThe World's Most Extraordinary Homes (Just Not Australia)
Comments (16)As mentioned previously, the balustrade and safety barrier regulations exist for good reason, ultimately to prevent accidental loss of life. No equal counter argument, period. Are they overly restrictive? Not necessarily. Are they tighter than other countries? Definitely. Can we vary them? Sometimes, if you can prove compliance to the deemed to satisfy provisions. Can we achieve the same aesthetically clean "no barrier" designs in Australia as simply and to the same degree as in other countries? No. But these more restrictive conditions don't necessarily equate to more restrictive architecture. Arguably we have to work harder and be more creative within constraints to get what I'd describe as quality and clever architectural solutions, but you know what? Too bad. And this is what separates "the men from the boys" so to speak (no gender inequality meant at all) I thrive on the creative opportunity within the constraint and it challenges our professional to go deeper creatively using the breadth of of skills to achieve results in arguably more challenging conditions. Its an easy cop out just to whinge about safety barriers or whatever the particular restriction is based on predominantly aesthetic/visual/spatial goals. Design solutions will ultimately reflect/respond to the contextual conditions. Yes outside of Australia there is less regulation around matters of safety that can be exploited by design solutions to sometimes achieve visually and spatially breathtaking results, such as in the images shown on this post. Like in all situations it's about balance and priorities and when practicing design and architecture in this country issues around safety are managed more robustly by regulation, which in turn naturally requires design solutions to work within the limits, which in many cases, due to the particular project priority stack and/or capacity of the people involved, results in less "integrated" solutions. At the end of the day, quality architecture is important and there's not enough of it here IMO, but that aside, safety barriers won't and don't prevent great or interesting architecture, but they do reduce/minimise loss of life, particularly young life, and that there I think for any project regardless should be the absolute highest priority, above and beyond any potential aesthetic or spatial outcome....See MoreWhat to do when your architect ignores your instruction
Comments (7)You said you loved the concept design but then the estimates came in too high. Find some more money so you can do it or do what the architect has suggested by going single storey. We all see some quite bland designs, standard fit out, cookie cutter as you noted; this is all due to budget being too low for the brief. Plenty of Projects all get watered down so they're affordable. Plenty of additions to dwellings can just be expensive to achieve. Do some quick calculations yourself - minimum $2500+ per square metre of new added space for bog standard fit out. Add in the bathroom at $20k, kitchen at $20k, laundry $8k, staircase at $15k, fire rated walls between existing and new, upgrading existing dwelling...... plenty of architect designed residential homes are pushing $5k per square metre. This is not really 100% accurate just ballpark figures to get started on so we don't end with a project we can't afford. It just adds up real quick. The designer should have known budget up front and worked to that or at least been within 10% at this early stage. Build costs between builders shouldn't be that far apart unless one is missing something so I wouldn't bother builder shopping with plans missing vital construction details just yet. If you're unhappy with current architect, move on to another. Why not consider a building designer or a local draftsman perhaps....See Morelomboshouse
7 years agoMB Design & Drafting
7 years agoDr Retro House Calls
7 years agoUndercover Architect
6 years agoMy Architect
4 years agoAudrey1967!
4 years ago
oklouise