Conceptual sketches

Kyle and I have been through 3 different engineers so far, and we think we've finally found the right one. We wanted someone with a bit of imagination of their own (rather than simply ticking boxes), who was a little excited about the unusual nature of our project (rather than daunted by it), who was willing to work with us as a team, and seemed to understand our vision for the property.

Previously we were looking at something based off the Arc House, designed by Owen Geiger, however given the wind at the site flat roofs were becoming more complicated and technical than we were willing to deal with and we've returned to something more like the Enviro Dome below:

To assist in communicating the vision, I'd done some conceptual sketches of our intended house, focussing not only on the internal layout but also the features I thought an engineer would need to be involved with.

Firstly, the vision for the future:

We imagine building the 3 domes of the house first, with small butresses to either side to act as a retaining wall on the berm. A little while down the track we'll add an outdoor covered area a little way off the house, again bermed by necessity because of the hill. This may or may not end up as a place for our cats to roam (enclosed) outside, as they are strictly indoor animals. Someday much further down the track, we want the option to extend the house off the other side if the mood takes us.

Bermed earth-walled structures make a lot of people nervous (even in spite of the whole earthship thing). Water is the first question to come up, so we wanted to have an answer (or at least the start of one) ready.

It seemed to me to be a no-brainer that the goal would be to avoid any water ever getting close to the waterproof membrane, so we'd need a drainage system.

It also brings up the question of ventillation. In a house like this, ventillation is another way of regulating temperature. The berm makes earth-tubes seem like a straight-forward idea, with the hillside allowing us to vent them downhill meaning we won't have the problems with moisture build-up and mould that plagued the early PassiveHaus models.

The exact point at which the earthtubes exit the hillside doesn't really matter at this stage, so I just drew curvy lines.

Finally, earthen buildings in wet parts of the world need a 'big hat'. I explored a lot of different ideas for roofing, and finally ended up with something pretty simple but hopefully functional.

I wasn't sure about insulation - seems a bit counter productive. On one hand it would keep any warm generated inside in in winter, but it would also stop the sun heating up the mass of the roof. I'm not convinced it would work out in our favour, and the engineer agreed. However, Council authorities like to see mundane, regular things like insulation when they approve Development Applications. We'll see how that one pans out, but I think we'll be good as it's usual for rammed earth structures not to have insulation in the walls.

I'd also done a drawing of the internal layout, on graph paper to make it more accurate for size:

Later on, however, I realised that we'd have to switch it around a little as the bathroom and kitchen can't be directly connected, but we want to retain that orientation for the kitchen/laundry so we can have morning sun in the kitchen.

The engineer we've chosen seems keen on all fronts, nothing is an obstacle just a technicality to figure out. We like this approach!

Work begins!

This weekend was the beginning of two weeks off work for both Kyle and I. Two weeks of what we hope will lead to basic infrastructure on the property.

Most of Saturday was spent shopping (heavy duty pants, welding visors, lots of stuff from the tip), during which we resist the feeling that we are haemorrhaging money and try to remind ourselves that this is what we spent so long saving up for anyway.

Sunday was a trip to the site. We knew we weren't going to get very much done on this trip (the first when we actually own the place - we took a brief trip out a day before settlement and did some blackberry clearing, but we figure that doesn't really count). The purpose was really to talk over what happens next and get a better feel for the place. Early on we realised you can't really skimp on the time you spend talking it over before you start - a constant process of revisiting and reclarifying and making sure you both have the same vision in your heads and the same idea of what steps happen when.

So, we explored a bit first...

There are several areas we have started calling wombat villages:

But also lots of smaller holes here and there that are probably echidna's, or various other burrowing crawlies:

There's also one particular tree on the far side of the creek that had three birds nests:

Last time we were at the property the creek had obviously flooded a little while before, up perhaps a metre or two. I've checked the weather data and it looks like it floods that much quite regularly but the catchment area isn't big enough for it ever to go higher.

The water is quite clear, though, and trickles pleasently:

We went further up the hill on the other side of the creek than we have before - technically the property boundary is the creek itself, but when the property was subdivided from the very large cattle station surrounding it the creek was too hard to fence so they put it on the top of the ridge. This means we have an extra 20m or so all along the creek of very steep south facing slope with lots of scrubby trees. So we went all the way up to the ridge to take a look along the fence line.

We found evidence of past bushfires, though obviously from quite a while ago:

There's a quite lovely spot with a bit mossy rock in the shade:

And the inevitable two or three spots with a large thicket of blackberries - this one is clinging around some large rocks, and it looks like some of the wombats have made tunnels through it to get to burrows underneath. Kyle tentatively leaned over the edge to take a look from the top:

At the top of the ridge we looked out over the neighbours property, a little greener than ours as it had obviously been grazed whereas ours has had the grass dry out over winter then regrow so it looks a bit brown from a distance.

Then we stood in the middle of the ridge and looked back up at our place. You can see a bunch of trees at the top, but only 3 of them are actually on our property.

After exploring we had an extensive discussion about what we want to achieve over the next two weeks. We've talked a fair bit about this before, but it's different when you're standing there and can see the scale of it and where things will go.

We bought some stakes with flags on from the tip shop ages ago, thinking they'd be useful one day, so we staked out where our outdoor kitchen will go (this is where we'll build the barrel oven). It will have a roof over the top, but otherwise be quite basic, at least to start with. You can just see the brightly coloured flags in the picture below. We've put it beside one of the trees right at the top of the hill, as we think that's a nice spot for entertaining - you can see pretty much everything from there.

A somewhat less definitely permanent composting toilet block will go a little way over on the other side of the tree.

Then we really got to work. We wanted the first thing we build on the property to be a little veggie patch. Nothing big enough to distract us from the build for the moment, but just something to say "we've started" and to begin as we mean to go on.

We staked it out pretty basic, with a few bits of wood we had lying around from ages ago that weren't going to be used for anything else much. We cleared the grass, and turned over the soil:

The neighbouring cows were fairly suspicious of us at first - they had lots of calves among the herd, and all gathered together staring at us. But eventually they got used to us, dismissing us as just odd humans I suspect.

So, first days work and we have a veggie patch!

A long way to go, but we definitely feel like we've started now!

The Property

Today we exchanged contracts on the property, after many delays caused by excessive paperwork in the system. We're now officially committed to this crazy idea. No backing out, no changing our minds - we'll just have to make a go of it!

The property itself is 25 acres of grassy slope, facing almost due north (very slightly to the east), in a (relatively) high rainfall rainfall area just outside of the town of Braidwood in NSW, Australia. The commute to work in Canberra will be just over an hour each way (an hour was what we considered our upper limit when looking for a block, though over time we hope to shift to working more from home/part time).

There's somewhere between 5 and 15km of unsealed road before the gate, depending which direction you come in from. The driveway itself is unsealed, and had quite a few weeds sticking up the first time we went there.

It's one thing to see '25 acres' written down on paper and quite another to walk it. We knew this was a problem for us going in to a property search, having been city kids we really had little concept of the scale, but thought it would be quickly solved once we were actually there. It wasn't with this one, as the property is almost completely treeless (nothing to give a sense of scale) and the hills are such that there's no one place you can stand and see all 4 corners (or even just opposite fences).

The view is very nice though - we think it looks better from a bit further down the hill. I've always been quite critical of people who buy a nice block then build a house right at the top of the hill, thinking "you're going to die in a fire" (I'm not being malicious with this thought, just commenting on the fact that so many people seem to prioritise scenery over bushfire safety in a country that's rather prone to fires). We like that our view looks nicer from further down, which is where we'd choose to build the main house anyway. Plus we intend to plant lots of trees so things will look different over time anyway.

At the bottom of the hill it flattens out again for a bit, before a small but apparently permanent creek.

The creek is just a little too wide to comfortably jump across. At some stage we'll build a little bridge, I guess. Perhaps a flying fox? It's easy to dream big when the work to get it done is so far ahead of us.

There are a few small patches of what looks like blackberries by the creek - they've clearly been sprayed before and are only just growing back, so we'll progressively rip them out.

When we went back to visit a few weeks after this first time, to confirm we still actually liked the place before committing to purchase, we saw something poke it's nose out of a small burrow at the edge of the creek. It could have been anything really, but we think it was furry rather than scaled and prefer to hope it's a platypus rather than admit it's probably a rat. We've also seen a very respectably sized lizard, probably a blue tongue, sunning itself by the creek.

We've seen a fox every time we've been there, so one of our first tasks will probably be to remove said fox. As sweet as it looks it is destined to become an ex-fox long before it has the chance to threaten our chickens/ducks or, more importantly, possible platypus.

There are, however, wombats.

There's probably twenty or so burrows in the hillside, all down by the creek and none at all further up. We know that wombats can be destructive to anything put in the way of their habitual pathways, so we figure we'll have to find out if these burrows are still active then build our pathways around the wombats habits. We'll see how we go.

The far side of the creek is a much steeper hill. Technically the property boundary is the creek itself, but it's difficult to fence a creek so when the property was created by subdivision the fence was put at the top of the hill opposite. In terms of agricultural land, this little section of no-mans land that we've incidentally acquired by virtue of the fence is not particularly useful as it faces almost entirely south. We won't be able to build any structures on it, but I thought that planted with a few things that will thrive in the shade it may be a good sheltered spot for bee hives or some such. Kyle's terribly phobic of wasps (for what I consider fairly good reasons on the basis of a very unfortunate prior experience involving a large angry swarm and a slow-moving cherry-picker) and finds bees a bit too similar for comfort, so the hives themselves will need to be out of the way a bit.

Not including the no-mans-land across the creek there are a grand total of 3 trees on the whole block. Looking back up the hill at them gives a little sense of the scale of the place.

Perhaps close-up helps a little more, for comparison?

We've got a good spot for the little house near the driveway up the top. Easy to get materials in, don't need the added expense of putting in extra driveway until later on, but a slight disadvantage regarding a head for water pressure from tanks. The big house will go in a nice hollow in the hill about a third of the way down the slope. There's no building envelope (set location where you have to build a house within the property) so we have free reign on where to build.

This property ticked off all of our requirements, plus a few of our 'not necessary, but nice' list:

• big enough for veggies + livestock of some sort + workshop + house(s) + whatever else we think of down the track
• building entitlement, prefer lack of established building envelope
• zoned appropriately for pigs if we want them later on
• gentle slope (for control of water flow across the site), preferably north/north-east facing (for good sunshine)
• few established trees (council's are fussy about cutting down trees, we prefer to be able to choose the type of vegetation on the property which we hope will grow to be extensive, so grassy was best)
• internet available by 3G/4G or fixed line (because we're tech-heads)
• max 1 hour commute to work (over time we'll lessen our commitment to work in the city)
• established dam, or potential dam sites
• (bonus) reasonable annual rainfall
• (bonus) electrical mains in the vicinity (just in case)
• (bonus) potentially abundant wildlife
• (deal-breaker) "feels right" (such an indefinable quality, but so necessary)

Initially we were looking for blocks under $200,000 - this one came in at just a bit over, but we like it so much we think it's worth it.

Settlement is officially the 14th of September. This is the day we will make the shift from the 'planning' stage to the 'doing' stage, and we expect the pace to speed up quite a lot from there.

Very rough plans for a little house

The inspiration for our current plans are largely based on a design by Owen Geiger at the Natural Building Blog. I don't know if anyone has ever built this house design (whilst plans are available from the site, it's not clear how many people have purchased each one let alone built it).

I ditched the curve fairly early on, for simplicity's sake, though it means putting in buttresses to support the walls. This was helpful initially doing drawings and sketches, but more recently I've wanted to add them back in again. At first I diverted quite a long way away from the original layout, and found myself coming back to it with each drawing. Eventually, the only addition was lofts.

Currently these plans have been done just by me in SketchUp. Ultimately we'll need to involve an architect, or a structural engineer at the very least. But we want to have a very clear idea of what we're asking for before we do, as it's unlikely we'll find people who have experience with this kind of building. Given the overall project it's also important that either Kyle or I (or both if possible) have a pretty solid understanding of the whole thing and each of the features we want to use so that we can take advantage of recycled materials we find, and if something doesn't happen as planned during the build we can improvise effectively.

I'm not really convinced by the split levels in the roof. I did it that way at first, so we could have a loft on one side, but in hindsight I think it'll be easier to have the whole roof at the same level and have lofts on both sides. The split is likely to be a weak point for leaks, and difficult to put together. Then you need fancy bits for guttering, and the higher the roof the less restricted you are in terms of water flow into tanks given the loss of vertical height in leaf traps and first-flush diverters.

There are a lot of details still to iron out. I'd like it to be a bit smaller overall, but we'll have to work on the layout a little and work out how attached we are to our current furniture. For example, we have a big purple couch at the moment. We love it dearly, chose it very carefully, and use it thoroughly. But, we could have a couch that is also a rocket mass heater. Having such a large object fulfil multiple functions makes good sense in a small house. In-built furniture has other benefits, you can work ventilation around it more easily, it can be structural support for something, and you don't have to worry about the fabric fading in the sunlight (not that I did anyway, clearly I make a poor homemaker).

So it will be a little while before our development application gets made, but we have a start. Aside from the house plans there are other plans, like the composting toilet application and solid fuel heater application if we do decide to put in a rocket mass heater (seems a no-brainer to me).

Records keeping

I've emphasised the need for meticulous planning already, but the other half of this is meticulous records keeping so as to compare the plan with reality. Perhaps it is a background in the sciences that gives me a longing for data.

Kyle and I know that things will not always go to plan. We are not naive. Good planning, however, will be the key to our success. Good records will let us know concretely when our plans are going awry, and by how much.

Two areas in which planning and records are important are Time and Money. Time can be both planned for and tracked through the Gantt charts I have mentioned previously. Whilst the program used to do that has financial functionality attached I am not very familiar with it. It also occurs to me that the way in which we record events will be different to purchases - sometimes these cross over, but as we are doing the majority of the labor ourselves events are essentially 'free'.

For the sake of simplicity I have begun a spreadsheet on GoogleDrive that is attached to the below form. Kyle or I can enter the details of any purchases, and I can build automated functionality into the other sheets that categorise our purchases into more useful breakdowns.

It is likely the form will become more complicated at some later stage...

Critical Issues

As planning for this project progresses, a number of 'critical issues' have emerged. Some suggest obvious solutions, others await finding land, and several require further investigation before a solution is clear. Currently our thinking has been broken down as follows:

Money?

• Not a whole lot of savings, but significant income for a couple of our respective ages (we enjoy the benefits of Jenny having been in the right place at the right time early in her career).
• Potential from first home buyers grant (time-dependent as this is soon to be discontinued).
• Stamp duty minimal on vacant land.
• Unknown borrowing potential on such a project - checking with banks.
• Intention is that land is major cost.
• Conveniently aligns with our vision of using pre-loved materials wherever possible.
• Obviously there will be many materials that must be used new.

Land?

• Big enough - around 20-30 acres, but would consider larger in preference to smaller.
• substantial veggie garden
• pigs, maybe goats
• probably chickens at some stage
• several greenhouses
• Within 1hr commute from work for Jenny - we're considering how flexible we're willing to be with distances. We currently live in the ACT, and other wannabe-hobby-farmers are driving the market ever outwards.
• Subject to appropriate zoning for said pigs + house (Rural 1A)
• Council planning authority that is amenable to the idea - have begun investigating with the councils within our preferred region. Australia, in particular NSW, is infamous for being over-regulated, hence the title of this blog. We can only hope that consulting them in advance, coupled with the growing number of similar projects in the state, will lead to fewer road blocks.
• Dam/pond/creek is desirable, or the potential to dig a dam
• North facing slope or hill, for passive solar design.
• Internet connection (vastly preferred to satellites)
• Water and electricity connection - bonus, but non-essential
• Potential to sell solar electricity back to the grid
• Water connection great for droughts (inevitable) and during construction
• Both push cost of land up
• Solar power and rainwater collection will hopefully make this unnecessary

Where will we stay while building?

• Currently renting a house in town.
• Build a mini prototype on site.
• Probably will need a large shed for storage and/or out-of-the-weather workspace.

How will we learn how to build?

• Go to a workshop
• Ideally, build a place to stay whilst we're building! A kind of 'mini mark 1'.
• Volunteer to host a building workshop?

Who will build it?

• We will, with our hands.
• Probably will need help from others.
• Limited capacity to pay for labour.
• Potential within eco-building world to find volunteer labour with the promise of educational experience (tbh we like the feel of a community that helps each other build houses and fully intend to help a few other people first so as to learn the ropes, also it's just a nice thing to do).

When will we build it?

• Buy land within the next year or two.
• Soon enough that we maintain momentum.
• Long enough away that we can schmooze with planning authorities in advance and at least design the prototype to a point where we can begin a build very quickly upon settlement of a site (we see this bit as the challenge - we keep seeing perfect properties pop up, and we have to remind ourselves we aren't quite ready for them just yet).
• Need to take time off work - A very small prototype, planned well in advance, with the help of other people, could potentially be ready to live in within two months meaning limited time off work is necessary for that phase. Aligns with need to avoid paying for two properties for very long, however if land is very cheap (unlikely but possible given our limited requirements for power/water) build could potentially occur over several school holidays (we're both teachers).

What materials will we build it with?

• Intention is largely recycled materials, however for some aspects this will not be possible.
• Earthbags being explored as a preferred possibility. We are hesitant about the rammed-earth tyre walls of Earthships, but open minded.

Design features?

• Passive solar + Earth-bermed for minimal energy needs.
• Interior design by Kyle (ex painter/decorator) with Jenny's enthusiastic albeit inexpert suggestions.
• Greenery!

It seems like a long list, and a long timeframe for having started blogging about it already. We are encouraged in our search for land by the fact that our requirements will differ considerably from others making us more flexible. We also recognise the need to plan meticulously in advance to ensure this occurs as smoothly as possible. Having read through the projects of others, who largely document the build itself only, we hope that we can avoid some of the troubles experienced with planning authorities' attitudes towards "radical eco-builds" by starting the conversation well in advance of land purchase placing time pressure on the discussion.

Gantt Charts

Being enthusiastic fans of Grand Designs, Kyle and I came to the conclusion that the key to staying within a budget and to a timeline is meticulous planning. To that end, I've begun drawing up a Gantt chart using Gantter. I was first introduced to Gantt charts at the tender age of 8 when my parents decided that having two small children was no reason why they couldn't backpack around Europe for several months - my father mapped out the planning and the itinerary using Gantt charts (apparently he still does).

Currently the timeline is non-existent, being dependent entirely upon when we find a suitable location which we hope will be within the next year. After that it will all begin in a rush, which is why we're bothering to plan so much before that point. Some dependencies are fairly clear already, such as the need to put up some sort of basic storage shed and water tank right at the start as we don't expect to be lucky enough to find a location with these already.

Drawing up this chart gives us a better feel for the relative 'when' of planning specifics - there are many things we can begin exploring before we find land, so that when we do confirming things like what goes where become a simpler case of applying one of various drafts we've already considered rather than starting from scratch. Our aim will be to move from buying land to building prototype to moving in as quickly as possible as it will be beyond our means to fund our current rent, land mortgage, and building costs at the same time for long.

Tracking progress through the plan as we go will help keep us on track and make it easier to prioritise various tasks amidst the sea of to-do lists we'll end up with. We hope it will also help us react to the unexpected. We won't let the plan become a constraint as things change around us - after all, you only have a plan so you know when you've gone off it, surely? Teaching has taught us both that. Hopefully at the end of this whole thing we can compare the before 'plan' with the after 'reality' and see some similarities!

Data Logging

Quite a while ago Kyle and I started exploring greenhouses as a way to extend the growing season for our vegetable garden. I found all sorts of cool things, from collections of recycled windows to geodesic domes to fully earth bermed enclosures, all of which make me very excited.

Whilst construction of greenhouses and our intentions for them are probably for another post, one thing I read again and again as I looked into growing in greenhouses was that everyone wished they'd kept more thorough records as they went along. This was echoed more concretely as I looked into earthships - many people were asking various owners of earthships if they had temperature recordings. Whilst we don't necessarily intend to build an earthship, our structure will be likely end up echoing many of the structural features of an earthship.

The science teacher in me also quite likes the idea of inserting all sorts of data loggers into the structure. Partly I just like data, partly it will provide invaluable information for proactive changes to the structure if it has problems, and partly because no one else seems to have done it yet (not openly published anyway) and someone clearly should.

With all this in mind, we intend to log temperature in several locations (a few inside, and outside), and probably humidity. Ideally measurements would be taken every few hours throughout the day, and streamed to the web somewhere. I know there are remote weather station kits that do something similar, so I figure its just a case of tweaking the bits a bit and fiddling with the software to make it accessible and intelligible.

Given that I'd like to conduct the data logging right from the start, I figure we should have this hanging in the back of our heads as we go through the planning phase. So often this sort of thing becomes an afterthought and opportunities are missed. I'd prefer to be thorough.

The Prototype Plan

Two of the problems associated with a project such as this suggest an obvious solution. We need a place to live while we build our home, as it is beyond our means to pay both rent and a mortgage on land at the same time for long. We'd also like to accumulate some experience with this style of building. It seems obvious, then, to build a smaller 'prototype' house - a tiny house that echoes the techniques used in the larger one.

We have been inspired by the 'Honey House', featured heavily as an example and cover graphic of 'Earthbag Building' by Kaki Hunter and Donald Kiffmeyer, a book we find extremely helpful. The Honey House is a medium-sized dome with a loft upper story. Given that this is intended to be a temporary home (with potential to convert to granny-flat, guesthouse or workshop at a later date) we aren't particularly concerned by small size. We have found plans of several small designs we think are possibilities:

Kyle and I both like the double-domed version - it offers no experience in roofing, and little in passive solar design, but it is an earthbag building with all the electrical and plumbing challenges we will face, plus the lofts have excellent storage potential for such a small space!

There was considerable discussion about the benefits of doing this temporary home thoroughly, as opposed to doing it small and quick. As we had decided that the purpose wasn't just temporary accommodation, but also to practice as many of the techniques used in the bigger house as possible, it makes a good deal of sense to make it truly a home rather than just a rough prototype. The time and expense in, say, ensuring it has proper plumbing will not be wasted. We are also familiar with the tendency of build projects to run over time, hence we must be prepared for our time in this temporary home to be extended unexpectedly. There will need to be compromises, however we think if we keep that purpose in mind we can achieve it at relatively low cost/time investment.