Visitors of all kinds

Very pleased to say that both Cumbria Green Build Festival tours yesterday were fully booked and we welcomed a wide-ranging group of would-be self-builders, professionals and young architecture fans.
To top off the good times we say our red squirrel in the garden this morning, for the first time in over a year!

Come & Visit Us

...As part of the Cumbria Green Build Festival, on Sept. 16th 2010
Full info here on the free event
PS we are also in Grand Designs magazine this month...

Some local 'charm'

There I was lamenting the sudden closure of the Sawrey Stores, a valiant village shop that for several years supplied us with milk, odds and ends on our way to and from the Shack.....
I admired the lady who ran it and advised all our guests to use the shop rather than the Hawkshead alternatives nearby.

And then I happened across her last blog entry, which offers no explanation for the closure but does include a rather sarcastic snipe at the Shack and ourselves!

"Funny how there was no mention of their plans to let it out, not sure what the council planners might think, especially as there is such a shortage of affordable housing in this area"

Sadly the blogger has disabled comments and so we're unable to respond directly to her, so I'll just put her right on a few things here instead:

In our first planning application we offered to restrict the occupancy to local-only, as we too have concerns about affordable housing and were prepared to put our money where our mouth was: the LDNPA rejected this restriction

Incredibly, some of the most vociferous local objections to our proposed plans for the Shack were that - I quote - "they plan to live in the house instead of it being used as a holiday let"!
These objections came from 'locals' who for some reason sought to maintain the very situation that has probably contributed to the closure of the Sawrey Stores - i.e. few permanent residents

We finally got the Shack's planning permission after 5 long hard and expensive years of battling - understandably some of our domestic circumstances shifted in the meantime and we in the end lived in the Shack for 6 months

We are now obliged to live in a nearby tied house linked to one of our jobs - this is a very common situation here in the Lakes. The Shack remains our only owned home and one that we use and cherish a great deal

I don't need to tell anyone reading this that starting a new-build in a recession means making a few harsh decisions about how to keep your head above water - renting the house out sometimes being one of them

We dedicated a sizable portion of the Shack's building budget to using local suppliers and companies (often at much greater expense than available alternatives) , and therefore feel that the project supported the local economy as much as possible
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The shopkeeper's comments of course show how complex a rural, tourist-driven economy is, and also - sadly - that we make assumptions about our neighbours' circumstances based on presumed greed and dishonesty. This isn't unrelated - the seasonal 'boom and bust' of the tourism calendar means that quality, ethics and consistency are relegated in favour of whatever-it-takes-to-make-a-quick-buck (before my month of recovery in the Maldives) , and the sheer exhaustion of customer service at the cliff-face of visitors in their thousands takes its toll on people's faith in human nature.

We struggled a great deal with the principles of letting out the Shack and I used to think that in an ideal world of course we'd be rich enough to keep the place entirely for ourselves. But now, after 6 months of guests, I've now changed my position as I have been won over by the appreciation of our visitors. After the pain of the planning and build it's extremely gratifying to hear feedback on how the design of the house works for people, what makes it special and how the experience of staying at the Shack can be healing, cathartic, eye-opening.

Importantly for us, the Shack also works as an educational experience - few visitors have had the opportunity to stay in a self-build contemporary building or an eco-building in this country - and with the rise of Grand Designs et al there is a huge curiosity to experience this first hand and to take some of that experience onwards into one's own life.
It's very exciting to think that the Shack can inspire more great architecture, and that our hospitality is part of that.

Media attention

In swift succession (ah, the rigour of journalism) we have featured in both Wallpaper* and the Guardian recently as one of "the best cabins in the world", the latter causing a temporary suspension of our website due to traffic volume!
http://www.wallpaper.com/cabinclass
http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/gallery/2009/aug/04/best-cabins-in-the-world?picture=351182492

Happy Campers

Well it's hat-eating time for me.
I would be the last person to expect that renting our hardwon self-build to complete strangers would be a rewarding and life-affirming experience - but I can say that it really is!
Guests we've had so far have been just unbelievably appreciative and have treated the house like royalty. It's fascinating to read the visitor's book - it seems most people arrive expecting to get out and about a lot, but then they are so relaxed by the house that they rarely manage to get onto a fell or into their cars until they reluctantly leave.
It's a tribute to Charlie the architect's skill in creating such an oasis - but also very amusing when I remember the screaming hab dabs (actually, what are they?) that both Adam and I let rip with at regular intervals during the build. What a contrast to the now Zen-like calm that pervades the place and makes it so unique.

Honey, I just cut the house open

Try as we might we couldn't get a soul locally to take on the install of our stove in our wooden house. Calls were not returned, even after visits to inspect the matter, heads were scratched etc etc. This is how it came to pass that, after very very detailed communications between architect and local building control officer, Adam had to do the job himself.
From his silence (DIY round here is usually wildly swear-y), I could tell that ( though we had concise instructions on how to do this) he was rather worried.

To save space the stove is a Eurostove inset model, with its firebox in effect 'outside' the house in the storage recess under the big panoramic window. The twin falled flue therefore passes up through the cladding outside the window, upwards through the 'eaves' of the flat roof and out the top of the house (the flue isn't in in this pic). I have never seen any other stove installed this way, not had anyone else we spoke to about it! Hence Mr Building Control coming out to get his head round it and ours.

So effectively we had to cut out the SIPS panels under the window for the stove, loadbear onto temp. structures at either side, add an agroprop below the stove on the base of the building, and pray. I had a vision of the house turning 'V-shaped' and caving in, thankfully unfulfilled. Between the actual stove and the building (see diagram) there is a complex layering of things like vermiculite board, that I didnt know existed.

The stove sits on a bespoke cast concrete hearth made for us (and better still, delivered up the hill by hand) by the excellent Lancaster Cast Stone (also now doing a simple surround for us) (www.lcs-uk.co.uk)
And now, we have had the fire on, its gorgeous, and save for maybe adding a bit more chimney onto our roof for better draw, it all seems to have worked.

Bank Holiday pause for enjoyment

My sister and her family visit this weekend, the first in my family to see our endeavours since the site was a mouldy old log cabin on the hillside. It's given me an incentive to have a good clear up in the spring sunshine and even take a moment to enjoy the place. The light through the fresh leaves is astonishing, very Japanese, I could get quite emotional....

Over and out - I have to start grouting again.