Welcome!

I'm not sure how special this is, but I'm super excited about my little office area, actually, I'm excited about the entire kitchen/office/pantry/mudroom area. It is my dream area. :)

I love that, Michelle! I do have an office/sewing room in the plans that I'm pretty excited about. I run a small business (out of my children's playroom, currently!) and I can't wait to have my own space for it!

This is the outside of our house. We will be doing brick except right under the porch which will be siding. Posting layout below.

We used the outside of this house plan that I found on monsterhouseplans.com.

The windows and doors aren't all drawn in. My builder draws his own plans by hand (he's older!) and we discussed all of that today. So not everything is drawn in - but you get the idea. :)

This is the 2nd floor. Also no windows drawn in yet. :) The house is 4100sq ft - we have 4 kids and plan to adopt in the future so the space will get used, for sure!

We built for aging in place and for low maintenance and energy costs. So we built green (closed cell insulation, geothermal heating and cooling, 5kw solar panels, finished walk out basement with passive solar design, etc.). We built for low maintenance...vinyl exterior, all azek trim, 50 yr roof, vinyl flooring instead of wood. We built for aging in place...one floor living, latches not knobs, doorways to accommodate wheel chair, built in bench and hand shower in shower, large enough space to turn wheel chair in front of toilet, ramp access to back of house.

Of course, the rest of the house design was to fit our lifestyle and might not work for others, but it works great for us.

We will be doing brick except right under the porch which will be siding.

Doesn't it make more sense for the lighter material (siding) to go over the heavy material (brick)?

You will regret things no matter how much you plan ahead. My advice is not to get bogged down in your regret. This happens to me from time to time and I have to remind myself that I am very lucky to have my beautiful house and for the most part I absolutely love it! It took about 4 years to really decorate it and make it my own. I think what makes our space unique is incorporating a few salvage/vintage pieces.

We will be doing brick except right under the porch which will be siding.

Doesn't it make more sense for the lighter material (siding) to go over the heavy material (brick)?

dekeoboe - I'll ask the contractor when we go over everything again! Good point!

Our house is special because we designed it :) Didn't use a plan, just sat down and started drafting it up exactly as we wanted it, it was fun. There's no other home like it, hence it's special.

When we decided to build, we wanted to do something totally different compared to typical new construction in the area:

* Custom floorplan. It's the only house like this on this planet.
* Full height basement (basements are very uncommon here)
* Concrete up to and including the roof
* Concrete over metal deck floors, ceiling and roof
* Triple-pane tilt-turn windows
* Anodized aluminum motorized rollershades outside of every window
* Cantilevered concrete wrap-around balcony
* Capacitive touch panels in every room for home control
* Centralized lighting (all circuits home run to basement, computer controlled)
* Exposed open web steel joists and steel I beams
* Steel stairs, steel grating as treads
* Vented Galvalume commercial siding with concealed fasteners
* Custom solid core 8 ft walnut doors with concealed Tectus hinges

Our home is unique because we designed it - okay, we used a plan and then redesigned the inside. It is a log house, so we have really gone wild designing the inside finishes: vintage (looking) snowshoes for the walls - they are actually light fixtures. They have homemade shades made out of maps of our area.

We designed the walk in shower in the MB - it has a tile mural of black bears, since we have bear "neighbors". We have a bench in the bathroom that we found on ebay - for putting clothes on while we're in the shower. It's totally unique.

One of our bedrooms is open to the great room - it can be closed off with sliding doors. We use it as an exercise room now.

We have a huge line drawing in our great room - about 34 feet across at the base. It is of Psalm 121:1-2 ("I lift my eyes to the hills) and of some mountains.

The vanity in our second bathroom has a map of our mountains in the top - kind of like decopauge. It was a custom job from the cabinet maker. We've had people in the bathroom planning hiking trips!

I am kind of a creative thinker, so most of what we've done in this house has come from my wild mind. My dh and I then debate the idea, quibble over whether or not it can be done and if we'll like the outcome. He's an engineer, so he makes the job actually happen. And we wind up loving the outcome!

Yet another crazy project but this will be definitely be our last major project and definitely unique and mouth watering. Ours is in it's final design stage; 100% designed and architected from scratch by me with ton's of input from my good wife and critique from my daughter. Absolutely unique and nothing like this out there however will be built to provide significant resale value after we are gone and proceeds split between my two kids. With close to 7500sf 124x62 footprint (per floor), we cut the design down from two storey (same footprint) with walkout basement to a single storey with walkout basement. Highlights will be floor to ceiling glass to the rear in the 20' ceiling 1179sf family room and 10' ceiling 755sf kitchen/casual dining providing breathtaking views of the harbor and snow clad mountains to the north and east. A 22' ceiling circular split level entry foyer flanked by curved stairs leading to the 12' ceiling basement, two full size bowling lanes in the basement, 6'-4" corridors on 1st floor, a 38x24 suspended 3 car garage on 1st floor above basement, another 1 car garage with car lift just below in the basement, a 124x16 deck on the rear with glass railings (to preserve amazing views to the rear). 20KVA ground based solar system, 4 zone heating/cooling with multi-zone radiant floor heating (yet to decide if geothermal or electric, waiting for survey) . A sub-basement wine cellar with an elevator leading to basement and 1st floor (in kitchen, in planning). The list is endless. Everything computer and remote controlled (I'm a computer guy). Perhaps not the way most would build it but I like to do things my way, code permitting. Build time 18-24 months and significant work will be done my me.

Here is a link that might be useful: Link to my thread.

This post was edited by Pinebaron on Fri, Jan 30, 15 at 8:41

Wow! You all are putting so much thought into the details! That's great!

Ours will be 4100sq ft - possibly 4200 if we extend the living room a couple feet. We are doing an intercom/music system all over the house so we can listen to music in every room. We will be adding a salt water swimming pool in a couple years and will have a speaker outside as well. :) I'm excited about our "lockers" for my kids to put their coats, backpacks, etc. in when they come in from school. I'm not big on actually seeing the clutter, so all of the lockers will have doors to hide it. My laundry room is going to 10x12 so I'm excited about having some extra room in my laundry room! We are also doing a walk-in pantry and a huge (to us!) master closet which I am OVER THE MOON excited about. We are so ready. We currently have 6 people in a 1800sq ft house with 3 bedrooms and it feels really tight. I'm ready for some extra space. :)

That looks like it will be a beautiful house design! I would also recommend not siding the area around the porch. I can't tell from the plans, but you might want to install a deck, a patio, or both. You will enjoy using them as much as you do your front porch. You may also want to consider a center island in the kitchen with a prep sink and cabinet space on one side and a breakfast bar on the other. Also, a new trend is to include a little beverage station in the kitchen where you can make coffee/cappucino's, etc.

Some things we really enjoy about our home are:

The pergola that covers a portion of the patio in back of the house. We grow clematis along the four corners.

Bay windows. They make the house feel cozy, and they really brighten the rooms.

During the winter months, we greatly enjoy our wood burning, field stone fireplace. We hired a mason to add it to our home last year.

We have a wine cellar that comes in handy.

A couple things I wish we had at our home are a wet bar in the family room and a sun room.

Special for me...windows in kitchen. I think you might regret not having any light coming into the work area. It's not the same, from other rooms. Something like this :)
{{gwi:2133585}}From Home pictures
{{gwi:2133586}}From Lavender Lass
{{gwi:2133587}}From Kitchen ideas

I'm with MistMan. Designing your own place, from scratch, into something totally uniquely you, makes it very special. That's what we love about our house, even when other people scoff at things or turn their noses up, or comment on what they would do different. It's ours. It's our blood, our sweat and our tears, and for us, 90% our own handiwork. That's something not everyone has.

When we come home every evening, all we can see is every decision we made, every fond memory, every adventure, every harrowing moment ("Remember when we put up these joists and this was just a big pit?") ("Remember when you fell down the chimney and I kept yelling "Don't bleed on the floor!"). That's what makes our house unique. Not many people have the experience to have some special memory from every part of their home.

There are a number of things that make our house special.

We have 7 acres of beautiful woods.

We designed the house from the ground up.

I did about 90% of the construction myself, single-handed.

ICF construction, with a LOT of effort spent on insulation and sealing.

Many interesting touches, such as flared window openings inside to make the thick walls more inviting, re-wired antique lighting fixtures, type tray pulls for kitchen pulls, vintage hardware for the barn door style door to the powder room, vintage refinished 5 panel doors throughout, reclaimed vintage flooring (maybe), vintage refinished mantle for the faux fireplace.

Oh yeah- most important- NO mortgage!!!

There is nothing out-of-the-ordinary special about our home...what is special is that all of the little (and not so little) touches = perfect home for US. From the fireplace on the porch that we use pretty much every weekend, 9 months a year (not so much in June, July, Aug, lol) to the custom designed cubbies in the knee space of dd's closet to store her vast collection of American Girl dolls...everything is just well thought out for our family. Little things like the most convenient spot for light switches and where to store kitchen utensils just make life so much easier.

Enjoy the ride! Your home looks lovely!