Frame goes up!

Only a few weeks since the foundations were completed and the frame is going up fast!

Almost completed as of writing. Check out all the pics!

Construction begins--Video walkthroughs uploaded

It has been a few weeks now since the first digger made the first impression on site. As of writing, the foundations are now complete and a concrete walkway has been poured around the house. All the mains water and sewage pipes are also now in.

Head over to the Video Walthroughs section to catch up with the progress of the build. Video above is the most recent.

New Renderings uploaded!

Head over to the Latest Designs page to see the new renderings! 

Construction Drawings Upload

To build a carbon neutral home, or at least one that approaches that title, insulation and air tightness in the building envelope is crucial.

Many months of planning and design have gone into these almost-final construction drawings.

Key features are:

• The avoidance of thermal breaks in the roof and floor. 
• Minimal thermal breaks in the walls (1.8m spans).
• Minimum 120mm rigid foam insulation in walls, 150mm in roof and floor. (R38 walls & R46 roof/floor)
• Exposed timbers where desired inside and where not up to 240mm of rigid foam insulation in walls and 270 in roof/ceiling.
• Excellent ventilation of structural roof, wall and under floor spaces.
• Thick foundation platform (240mm), well over building regulations for earthquake-prone Japan.
• Exterior wall foundation overhangs.
• Three vapor barriers in each wall, four in floor, five in roof (due to the layers of aluminium backing on the insulation panels and the house wrap).
• Outer skin of plywood should almost double the earthquake rating of the timber frame which is already over specification with bracing.
• Inside layer of plasterboard adds to insulation and sound barrier levels.

RC Helicopter Surveys Lake Views!

So it has been a just over a year since I bought the land and the house permits are almost ready and the build soon to begin! Now is the last opportunity to confirm the placement of windows and the final design features. As much of the house is designed around the views, including window placement and the roof terrace, I have always wanted a way of seeing from the final height of the building. In particular, I have been hoping that I will get a view of the lake from the 2nd floor windows and of course the roof terrace.

Not having a crane handy though, it has not been possible to check out what the scenery looks like at 4.5m (standing up on the 2nd floor), or at 7.5m (standing up on the roof terrace).

So you might imagine my excitement when I saw that there was an automated drone selling on amazon for around 300USD that could fly and take movies of what it saw.

I quickly purchased this flying seeing-eye robot and today put it through its paces. Got some great shots today that SEEM to suggest that I will (1) certainly get the lake from the roof terrace, and (2) may be able to see it from the 2nd floor windows.

Trouble was that it was pretty gusty a couple of meters into the air and it was difficult to get a consistent altitude reading as the copter bobbed up and down in the wind. Will try again on a much stiller day.

Check out the first video and pause as it goes through seconds 22-26 --I think 25 shows the lake at 4.7m. Video quality isn't great, but you get the idea??

This next video shows a great crash about halfway through, but you again see the lake between 17-18 seconds (4.5ish meters) and get a great views as the wind catches the drone between 42-45 seconds. Altitude stays at around 6m though so not sure if these views are really a reflection of that height. Again, will check on a calmer day. Great fun!

Final House Layout Mapped onto Land

Sugie-san, Tsuge-san and Murase-san spent this morning very kindly packing away the storage tent and marking out the outline of the house on the land. Here is a walk through! What a beautiful sunny day it was too!

DECIDED! Timber frame with DIY SIPS construction

A modern timber frame home with exposed posts and beams

It has been while since the last post and much has happened on narrowing down the construction method. I am now ready to announce the final construction decision and the rationale that went into making it!

The ecological concept drove me to research a wide variety of materials. I have been through straw bales, earth houses, papercrete, and just about everything else on the search for the best construction methods. I have settled on locally sourced timber. Where timber production is highly regulated it is perhaps the most carbon-neutral ecological material. The timber for my house will be sourced within one prefecture of the building site and will be Japanese cedar or "sugi".

Many houses are today made from wood, but today a wooden house normally means that the house has been built using the 2x4 method (also known as platform framing, stud wall or stick construction). Houses built in this style are strong and reliable and when well built can offer good insulation values. The disadvantage with building in 2x4 (or the larger 2x6) is that the structure retains no cultural or historical integrity--it could be a house from anywhere in the world.

The reason I went for a "timber frame" house rather than 2x4/2x6 was that it allowed me to preserve some of the character of Japanese timber framing style (again, 2x4 is a generic modern style made for structural integrity with no particular historical tradition).


For fast reference and those who are particularly interested, the biggest influence over the final decision on how to build the house was from Ted Benson's book, The Timber-Frame Home: Design Construction Finishing. The book Natural Timber Frame Homes is also a great read to get one enthusiastic about the style and its merits.

Benson's book explores the history of timber frame design as it has evolved across several parts of the world

Choosing to build in the timber frame method is also an advantage when it comes to Japanese building regulations. Essentially, unless going for an approved pre-fab or log-house company product, the easy options available to the home builder are 2x4, concrete or timber frame construction (zairai). Zairai is the most common construction method in Japan, and represents the most traditional style timber construction (although 2x4 is catching up fast at the time of writing).

With a Japanese timber frame on the inside of the house and insulating panels wrapping around this frame, the house will show off it structure to the inhabitants--all the posts and beams will be visible features of the interior living space. For an idea of how this looks do a google image search on timber-frame homes.

So, that's it, the house will be a timber frame with insulated panels wrapped around the outside in the Benson style. I will post more over the next weeks about the exact materials and sourcing. Thanks for reading!