The fastest way to determine the cost of construction on a new home is to ask a local general contractor for the latest average cost per square foot of finish floor area. It won’t be accurate, but it is a good starting point. Two years ago, in my region, the answer was $150 per SF for a small, medium quality home, and an average of about $300 to $500 per SF for somewhat larger homes which tended to call for higher quaility as well.  It has risen substantially since then, and it will be different in every region depending upon the availability of certain materials, how much shipping is required, the geological conditions on the land, the cost of living for the builders, and a variety of other factors. Also, one cannot calculate the cost of construction purely based upon the square footage of the floor area. That number is very easily shattered by a simple change such as complicated site preparation, fancy floors, or high end windows, or greater attention to insulation or heating techniques that require state of the art components.

Instead of relying upon square footage to tell me if I have exceeded your budget, I have to make regular overall assessments as I proceed with the planning. Then if you say “granite countertops” and “touch sensitive sink faucet fixtures” then I am going to look around for something else to slice off of the house to make that affordable. It’s a balancing act. If you are wealthy, this topic will seldom arise because luxury will trump cost in most cases. But most people have a limited budget. My obsession has always been to meet that budget the best I can. Then again, many people don’t build the house until 2 years after I design it. When that happens, some bets are off. There is never a better time to build a house than right now. Waiting always costs more. I don’t like to seem pessimistic, but I have never seen prices go down in the 30 years I have been in architecture. They slow down, but they don’t go down.

written by pencilman \\ tags: construction cost

I don’t get involved much in interior decorating, so I don’t care what kind of table lamps you buy. My job does involve including on the plans for the contractors what kind of installed lighting fixtures will require electrical boxes, mountings, and installed fixtures. There are a  staggering number of good website catalogs for shopping for lighting fixture styles. You can shop for them now and specify them for the plan, or we can specify only the type of fixture on the plan, and you shop locally when you are ready to attached them. For the architectural planning, I need to know the locations of the fixtures, and whether they are recessed, flush, semi-flush, wall-mounted, tracks, pendents, sconces, or chandeliers.

Here are some nice lighting catalogs for you. Have fun shopping.

http://www.lightinguniverse.com/

http://lightingbygregory.com/index.html

http://www.lampsplus.com/

http://www.kichler.com/

http://lightingfixtures.com/index.asp

In all cases, I recommend using flourescent or LED bulbs in the lights, but not flourescent fixtures, which tend to be stark and commercial in appearence. Remember, if you want to use LED bulbs, which last forever, and hardly burn any electricity, you will want to add a few extra fixtures here and there to compensate for the lower brightness of LED lighting.

written by pencilman \\ tags: Lighting Fixtures

Homes between 500 SF and 2500 SF are designed to a large degree around the stairs. The reason for this is that the stairs tend to dictate much of the circulation pattern in the floor plan, on both floors. If I place the stairs in the wrong place, it seems impossible to find a room plan that works well. A lot of space can be wasted if it is placed poorly.

A linear stair case on a 9 foot climb extends about 11 feet, but it requires a landing which extends that to 14 feet. Then it requires a 14 foot hallway to walk from the top of one flight to the bottom of the next. This hallway is the wasted space. So this 8ft x 14ft space uses 112 square feet.

The switchback stair case, or the switchback with a winder, will only require 84 square feet, saving 28 SF over the Linear stair. You still need the landings, but you don’t need the hallway. There are three walls to the switchback stair that can all be in rooms being useful. If you add the winder at the turn, the switchback will only require 76 SF. These are best used in very small homes when every inch counts.

A “spiral” staircase is usually a grand and decorative object built on the site with extra craftsmanship. Most people use the word “spiral” to refer to a “circular” staircase, and could also be called a helix, which is usually prefabricated in a metal shop and then shipped and installed on the site. The national building codes do not permit a metal “circular” staircase to be a primary staircase, unless it is 36 inches wide and the railing ballasters are no greater than 4 inches apart. This is large and rare.

In larger homes, when space is not an issue, any staircase style can usually be designed to fit well.

written by pencilman \\ tags: Circular Stairs, Linear Stairs, Spiral Stairs, stairs in small homes, Switchback Stairs

I have had a few clients mention one thing or another about Feng Shui principals of design. Usually people quote something someone told them about Feng Shui, not realizing that out of context the statement might not apply. Feng Shui is a complex system with many interdependent elements that are actually applied somewhat differently for each piece of land and each occupant. To achieve good Feng Shui or Vaastu, you really should start from scratch.

I have studied Feng Shui (Chinese Design) and Vaastu (Hindu Design), and whenever I can apply a general principal from one or the other, I try to do so. Many of the principals are universally good ideas. However, my experience with both is that it is very difficult to apply these eastern design concepts to western small home construction with any real purity unless the owner has extra money, the house’s footprint is somewhat sprawling, and the land is allows for some flexible positioning of the house.

That being said, the fact is that when I design a home that is truly successful and makes the client very happy to live in, and I go back to look at it from a Feng Shui or Vaastu point of view as an afterthought, I do notice that some elements of both do appear to be there. Real truth never dies.

If you want to study Feng Shui for free, try this link to an entire book about it that you can read online.

Feng Shui Book Online

written by pencilman \\ tags: feng shui chinese design