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Framing+Steel

Let me just point out one thing you may want to consider before designing your own home. Don't. Hire an architect, explain what you want, have them design it. It is a lot of fun to sit down and sketch out what you want and how you want to live, but not understanding the structural implications is grossly misunderstood.

So we thought it would be really cool to have a sunken living room and a curved front wall and an open living space and a bedroom that floated over nothing. Which is not a problem if you don't care how much its going to cost. Then by all means design away. There is more steel in this 1700sf house than there needs to be. Most houses- which we've kindly been referring to as 'boxes'- don't even require any steel. We racked up an 8k bill for the steel alone, not to mention the overage on the lumber. And we haven't even built those "really cool" stairs we want.

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Dirt: One expensive variable

It should be noted that if one is building on an "infill" lot, one should account for dirt to be imported and exported. Please read and repeat the previous sentence until it sinks in.
There has been a lot of dirt thrown around between the architect and the builder and the excavator regarding the basement, grade, floor joices, etc (I am going to save that post for after this whole thing is over). The implications this had was vast and varied.

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Uh, err, Uh. "Hey guys, answer me this"

Over the weekend, Terry and I walked over to the lot to poke around. We dropped down into the Devil is in the detailsDevil is in the details"pit" and walked around our new beautiful basement. We peaked into the cutouts for basement windows. We talked about where this would go and that would go....and "wouldn't a glass wine cellar look really hot over there."

Then I looked up and around and went "hmmmm, that doesn't look right...how are they going to backfill this?" Terry said "That wall looks like an oops." Well regardless of where the blame lies, it could be spread around enough to marry with some jelly and go down just fine. Point is, we all missed a detail in the foundation plan in which one side of a window well was not formed and a retainer wall was put in place for no reason. It's nothing major major, but it's just crazy that no one caught it. That pesky red herring of a wall height. The solution seems simple and we should have it ironed out by morning.

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Forms, Foundation and Fun

Over the course of the last week, B&D Foundations came in, set up forms, poured concrete, and Basement FormsBasement Formspeeled the forms away. We have one deep basement- all in all it is almost 13' deep. Why so deep? You ask. Well, we can only go so high with the height of the house, as not to encroach on the bulk plane (the imaginary lines that the city requires us to stay within). We also want 9' ceilings on all of our floors. Well, what we discovered was, in order to stay under the bulk plane, the first floor had to be on grade (100'0"). That meant the floor joists were going to have to be below grade. They would have to be set into the basement walls. And if we wanted to have at least 8' ceilings in the basement, we were going to have to dig to the proverbial 'China'.

I have tried to draw this out as well as possible. This is not what you would call and 'architectural detail'. But you may get the gist.

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Footings: The foundation begins

Sunday morning Terry and I went over to the lot with:

  • Two white sage sticks
  • Palo Saint wood sticks
  • Holy Water (have to keep the Catholic mom involved)
  • Ashes from Izzy and Maddie
  • 5 rocks that had value to us
  • Intentions and prayers that we had written down

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Watch out for that hole

Excavation began on Tuesday. I haven't been out of the house since
Monday- thank you Influenza. Stuart has been sending photos of the progress, but I didn't understand the magnitude until I walked over there today. WOW!

The basement needed to be 10'6", then an additional 11" for the footing. The excavation also needed to be about 5' outside of the actual walls. Add that up and we are digging close to the property lines, hence the Shoring. So I asked,"How many yards of dirt have they taken away?". Care to guess? About 550 yards. If you have ever done any landscaping, one or two yards seems enough soil to make your back ache, but 550. Geese.

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KABOOM!

I walked over to the lot at 7am. They were already there, ready to unload the excavator. Trucks and dump trucks were lined down the street. I thought to myself "This is a great way to make friends with your neighbors." Hillen Corporation was doing the work that day. Class A outfit. They were on time, very professional, and they even cleaned up after themselves. 

They rolled on the lot by 7:15 and by 8:00 already had the main structure down. It wasn't so much a KABOOM as it was a tickclackspfooshhhshsh. The main structure sat on the property line, so I was very nervous that there would be a pile of debris in the neighbors back yard. But the way they handled that rig was as gentle as holding a baby.

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Shoring

There are many advantages to living in the city. Access to good food, diverse communities, recreation, entertainment...I could go on and on.

There are some disadvantages with building in the city. Overly beauracratic systems of attaining permits and the ridiculous amount of over engineered laws.

Because our foundation wall is within 12' of our property line on the North side, we needed to 'shore' up the soil. I can understand this being a concern. We don't want the neigbors fence or porch to slide into our basement. But this is what a few days of shoring looked like.

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What does the darn thing look like?

You must know a little background with this project. We have been dreaming of our own house for years. I have sketches and sketches of floorplans- from new builds to additions on our current bungalow. But here is the thing, you can't really get serious about a house until you know what size your lot is going to be. And then there is the issue with the bulk plane and set backs (see zoning).

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Permits

I'm certain you've heard nightmare stories about getting permits. I'm certain you know someone that just snuck in a remodel under the radar to avoid the process of the permit. I'm certain the legacy will continue in cities across America to be the next closest painful process other than getting a root canal.

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