Our house plans

So, its not long now until October when I'll be in New Zealand with Steven starting to build our straw bale house. I'm so excited!

Here are the room plans. These bits of the plan don't show the wide decking that will be on the front and side of the house that will lead onto the garden, so you'll have to imagine that. The doors to the north (on this drawing) of the ground floor are big french doors and windows that will lead onto the deck, where we are going to have seating to the right (under the kitchen window) and where Steven wants an outdoor pizza oven. He has spent months and months getting the details just right, so that, for example, we have a kitchen window that slides open so that you can hand out drinks and pizzas without getting in anyone's way.

I designed the kitchen and it has a built in wine rack and cocktail cabinet (of course), and a nice big breakfast bar.

There will be stairs to the south (in this drawing) of the house with a study area to the side.

Click on the image for a larger view if you like.


Here is the upstairs. Its going to have a sloping roof on two sides, so the bedroom looks huge here but some of that space will be under the roof. The reading area is just going to be a space with a balcony looking down onto the living room with books and comfy chairs, and the thing in the middle is a bridge to access it!

One more thing. Matt has done the drawing for us so that the size of each straw bale is defined (they're big!). The walls are going to be half a metre thick because thats how big the straw bales will be.

I plan for the house to be finished next April, giving us 6 months to build. Whenever I say that my dad and my sister raise a quizzical eyebrow because they've been watching too many Grand Designs programmes where there is always a major disaster/delay before the final set of adverts. Fingers crossed then!