This little screened porch speaks volumes with regard to the argument of quality vs size. The painted wood is all redwood, the screening is bronze, the floor is flagstone, the furnishings didn’t come from a big box store. Which would you rather have… this porch, or one twice as large made of cheaper materials and furnishings?

I don’t think the answer to that question is a “right or wrong” situation but what confuses me is that the reality is that 99.99% of people choose the larger, cheaper option when building a home. Almost no one chooses the “intense quality option”… Why is that?

Originally posted 2015-06-15 13:05:34.

Originally posted 2015-06-15 12:51:55.

Writing the check for that copper roof was not easy back then, but the owners of this house have now watched each of their neighbors replace their roofs… twice.

And this copper roof?

It’s still as good as new… in fact, the owners could double their original investment by selling the copper to the local scrap yard.

Chances are that one of the owners children will soon buy the home off of the parents, and they too will never have to replace the roofing.

Sweet.

Originally posted 2015-06-07 13:24:13.

With just the addition of old pine beams this room became a very special place.

Originally posted 2015-06-07 13:09:33.

It was on this house that I learned that screen porches were not just for us common folk… but, that everyone loves a nice screen porch!

Originally posted 2015-06-07 13:03:32.

This is Inglecress…. a home near and dear to me.

I was the job foreman on this home. A foreman is the man in charge of the process of creating a home to look like something drawn on a set of plans. A foreman is the man who truly puts his blood, sweat, and tears into a home.

A year later and I would start my own company and begin the process of becoming a designer/builder. This home would provide me with inspiration in the possibilities of refined “rusticness”.

Originally posted 2015-06-07 12:56:29.

I must admit that the first time I saw this magazine I chuckled out loud. Now don’t get me wrong, I was flattered that a home that I had designed and built had made the cover of a magazine… but on a special issue from the folks at Timber Home Living on Energy Efficient Homes?

I do my best to build a tight house, to insulate and caulk everywhere that I can. Stress skin panels and spray-in foam are unmatched in their insulating capabilities but there are two features of my homes that I must confess should eliminate my work from the cover of such a magazine.

First of all, most of my clients, myself included, love having an old antique door for their front entrance. They are beautiful and add so much charm to a house. They also never completely keep the outside air where it is supposed to stay. I can get them tight with an hour or two of fussing, but as soon as the temperature or humidity changes they either don’t close properly, or there is air infiltration leaking around them.

And the second reason for my disqualification is that old log cabins are not air tight… I don’t care how much effort one puts into getting them sealed… and believe-you-me I try harder on each successive one that I build to get them as sealed as much as I can, but when the wind and rain are hollering outside, air is going to find it’s way in.

There is a reason they don’t build submarines out of logs.

I should make myself clear… my homes are very comfortable, the air leakage found around old wood is minimal, not even noticeable unless you are looking to find it. And besides… I don’t agree with the current trend of making a house so tight that there is no air exchange. I don’t think it’s healthy to continually re-breath the same air, air that is contaminated from all the products within the home.

We, at the Bradley home, open the windows and doors wide on every pretty day to let that outside air in. Anyone else an open window fan?

Originally posted 2015-06-02 14:26:32.

I was so concerned when it came time to design and build an addition for this precious cabin that I had built five years prior.

I was increasing the square footage of the house by nearly four fold… it would have been so easy for the cabin to have been visually lost.

I wanted to honor that sweet little structure, not kill it.

I think I did pretty well.

What do you think?

Originally posted 2015-06-01 15:04:04.

And you know, everyone just loves that bow window.

The homeowners tell me that visitors tend to stand around that window and just gaze out at the view for the longest periods of time. And, that this window is the “go to window”… when something is happening outside this where everyone flocks too.

That window is there because the designer (me) wasn’t too proud to admit that he could have done better. And it’s there because the builder (also me) was onsite everyday making sure that when the house was finished that were be no regrets.

Regrets are terrible things.

Avoid them whenever possible.

Originally posted 2015-06-01 14:51:37.

There are two things that I’d like to point out in this image…

First, notice that I had the men tack up an outline for the future chimney on the new addition’s exterior wall. This chimney had to be perfect. I had styled it on the plans to do my best to make it look the chimneys that are commonly seen in the southeastern part of the state of Virginia… (the area where this timber frame section had come from).

I was pleased with what I saw. I could see that I would be happy with the chimney. And the crew was pleased that I was pleased. 🙂

And then the second thing I’d like to reveal… it’s kind of hard to see in this photo… notice that we had framed in two window openings in the connector area (the area between the log cabin and the new timber frame addition). Those two windows looked great in my drawings. I was so pleased with them.

Everybody loved them.

But when I went inside that space, in what would be the future dining room, I was disappointed with the affect of looking out these small windows at the grand mountain view that rolled out before my eyes.

I went back outside and grabbed a lawn chair, you know, one of those cheap plastic ones from Walmart, and I sat right there where this photo was taken and stared at this house until the answer came to me….and that was… that a large bow window should go in this area.

The crew was amused, and the owners were somewhat shocked on their next visit to the jobsite when we had gone ahead and changed this wall.

But it had to be done.

A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.

Originally posted 2015-06-01 14:37:03.