Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems: Architect Dave Strachan's eco-friendly Auckland renovation

The fifth in our series of Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems visits the Auckland family home of architect Dave Strachan (of Strachan Group Architects), a former bungalow that's had a significant renovation with increased energy efficiency one of the primary goals.  The photographs are by Patrick Reynolds.

You could say that architect Dave Strachan has a 360-degree view of the process of designing and building a home. He was a builder before he went to architecture school and, along with his wife Colleen, he was his own client when he designed an extensive renovation of the couple’s bungalow in the Auckland suburb of Mount Eden (he also had to supervise his sons, who worked as builders on the project). This led to a mild case of multiple personality disorder. “When you’re the client, the architect and the builder, you wonder who’s calling the shots,” Dave says. “The client wants to know how much it is, the builder wants to know if you can do it easier, and the architect is reaching for the sky.”

Dave Strachan's family home in Auckland is a bungalow that's had a significant, environmentally senstive renovation.

Of course, performing these roles simultaneously saved the couple a lot of money. Their original bungalow was 180 square metres, but now the extension is complete, Dave and Colleen (who at the time had all four of their children living at home) have a renovated home measuring about 300 square metres in size.
  

The home before renovations began.

A view of the home after renovations were complete.

They initially explored the option of demolishing the bungalow and starting anew. Dave estimates that if a client was to pay a builder and an architect for an all-new home of that size (which includes a swimming pool), they would be looking at a bill of about $900,000 (plus the pool). In this case, Dave and Colleen completed the job for about $500,000. “I reckon we’re about $400,000 better off because we decided to keep the old bungalow,” he says. “And I think there’s something really nice about the embodied memory that’s still in our building – the heart of it still beats.” Part of the savings came from doing so much of it himself, but Dave still estimates that if a client was to undertake a similar project, they would save about $250,000 by keeping an old house.

The home's two-stage entryway features a garden
inside the building envelope that leads to the front door.

Two of Dave Strachan's conceptual sketches for the renovation.

A new indoor-outdoor living area at the rear of the house faces northwest and is usable year-round.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   
Dave does a budget estimate for a client himself at the sketch design stage, but calls in an independent quantity surveyor to estimate the cost of a build once the design has been developed. The biggest challenge, Dave says, is marrying clients’ wish lists to their budgets – and if they don’t match, letting the clients know quite clearly at the outset of the process that what they’re asking for is not achievable. The clients then have the option of scaling down their desires, or finding the extra finance to meet the budget.

The cliché that anyone taking on a new building project should estimate their budget then double it is, Dave says, “a horrible thought”. He prides himself on making clients aware of the full scope of potential costs at the outset of a project, including council and resource consent fees, building in a contingency for landscaping, and so on. If a client asks for something outside that scope, Dave says they need to be informed that such a decision will have budgetary implications. It’s a process that has worked successfully for Strachan Group Architects – a house they recently designed in the Auckland suburb of Parnell, for example, has a developed design budget (by a registered quantity surveyor) that is consistent with the original project estimate. “We’ve lost jobs where people have come in with a budget and we’ve told them it’s unrealistic, and they’ll go to someone else who tells them what they want to hear,” he says, “but you have to be honest with people about the process.”

The home's main bedroom looks onto the back lawn. The lightshade is by David Trubridge.

Q+A with Dave Strachan

HOME What was the hardest part about the process of renovating your own home? 

Dave Strachan We decided, rightly or wrongly, to live in it while we did it, so we put up with all the dust, mess, noise, and camping and decamping as you move around the building as various phases get completed. I remember lying in bed during a terrible storm after we’d pulled off as much roof of the old bungalow as we could cover with a tarpaulin and listening to the tarpaulin flapping around in the wind and finding water coming down the Gib board inside. With the design, I relied on the team at the office – you can get too close to a project like this, so it’s good to have people to talk to. 

Architect Dave Strachan.

HOME Does your background as a builder help you gauge a budget more accurately? 

Dave Strachan In general, you know how much everything costs. But we don’t do budgets with guesswork – in the initial stages, we calculate them by using the price books in our office. And we have a good feel for it and a collaborative approach with the builders we use. 

A view of the home's new living area with pool outside.

HOME What do you think of the old cliché that if you have a budget for a project, you should double it to get a realistic figure?
Dave Strachan I reckon there’s no excuse for that. The budget needs to marry reasonably well with the clients’ wish-list at the outset. After that it’s about knowing the budgetary consequences of the decisions the clients make, and informing them of that. We get a quantity surveyor in at the developed design stage and we don’t proceed with a project unless the client sees those cost estimates and says that they’re OK. Sometimes clients’ budgets don’t really match their dreams, and they don’t often admit that. A lot of it is about having a reasonable budget to cope with the scope that you intend.

Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems: the O'Sullivan Family Home

The fourth in our series of Design Case Studies visits the super low-budget Auckland home of architect Michael O'Sullivan (of Bull O'Sullivan Architects) and Melissa Schollum, which Michael mostly built himself. It's an inspiring tale of creating architectural magic on a low budget. This series is brought to you by Altherm Window Systems. The photographs are by Florence Noble.

Michael O'Sullivan (centre) with Melissa Schollum and some of the neighbours who
helped them build their house. From left: Seti Faaofo, Rhys Hanna, Ikimau Ikimau
(holding Michael and Melissa's daughter Mary), Michael, Melissa
(holding son Seamus), Fred Taupa and Mary Taupa.

Michael and Melissa’s 115-square-metre home in the Auckland suburb of Mangere Bridge (which was a finalist in our Home of the Year award in 2009), cost just $152,000, but that doesn’t mean you should presume you can get a house that cheap for yourself. The house cost so little because the couple didn’t pay a builder – Michael did all of that himself, with the regular help of some of the couple’s neighbours. “It’s the labour that kills projects,” Michael says, estimating that, if they had paid for a builder and for architects’ fees, their house would have cost over $300,000 – which is still a pretty good deal. 

Melissa in the kitchen, with its brass-clad island.
The plates on the mullions behind her are by Rachel Carley.

On this project, Michael was determined to do things differently from the start. “We didn’t have a budget,” he says. “We had $70,000 to start with, and we had decided to work with that in the first instance and see how we went.” That amount of money, along with many hours of Michael’s labour, got them as far as the basic timber structure being erected, and with the roof on. 

The kitchen and living areas have a cedar ceiling
with lights residing behind the triangular cutouts.

With their funds depleted, it was time to visit the bank, but not to request a conventional mortgage. “We went to the bank and said this is how far we’ve got, but we didn’t know how much it was going to cost to finish off,” Michael says. They did, however, know how much they could afford to pay off a mortgage each week, a figure the bank used to estimate the maximum the couple could borrow and set up what was essentially a floating overdraft. “They were initially a bit sceptical,” Michael says, “but they’re pleased now they’ve seen what we’ve done.”

This view of the dining area (with a dining table by IMO) shows
the home's main entrance. A small deck outside is shaded by an oak tree.

Michael and Melissa needed to remain extremely mindful of how much money was required to finish the building within their budget, but in a sense, the most pivotal budgetary decision – to keep the house relatively small – had been made early on. There is only one bathroom, but a more difficult choice was to design the house with just two bedrooms, as by the time it was nearing completion, the couple’s third child was about to be born. So far, however, children Seamus (4), Finbar (3) and Mary (2), as well as Michael’s son Rem (11), who stays occasionally, like their relatively large room with its bunk beds, and the house has been designed so the later addition of another bedroom is possible. Michael thinks the decision not to have a third bedroom saved between $15,000 and $20,000 in materials alone, as well as making the building process about two months quicker because of the home’s smaller footprint. (Since these photographs were taken, Michael has added an upstairs area with more children's bedrooms).

Seamus in the hallway leading to the bedrooms,
which feature heavy velvet curtains instead of doors.

Savings like this meant that there was enough money for strategic splurges in other parts of the house. The kitchen has marble-topped benches – a luxurious addition in a low-budget house – and the bathroom is lined entirely in vivid green marble. Admittedly, Michael managed to secure most of these materials at bargain prices, but although they still cost more than more basic materials would have, these additions add a textural richness that makes the compact house feel warmer and more generous that it might have otherwise. 

Finbar and Seamus in the tub. The bathroom is entirely
lined in green marble, a splash of luxury in a low-budget home.

There are other areas where Michael wished the budget had stretched. The bedroom ceilings are lined in basic pine ply, which Michael feels lacks the elegance (and is a little less forgiving of his limitations as a builder) of the cedar that the couple purchased to line the ceilings of the living area. But these are small quibbles compared to the overall satisfaction their completed home now offers – not only the space and shelter it provides for the family, but the lasting relationships this collaborative project established with the neighbours who helped Michael and Melissa out so much.  

A view of the home's second deck that connects to the living area and hallway.

Q+A with Michael O’Sullivan
 

HOME Your house cost $152,000. What would it have cost if a client had to pay for a builder and your services as an architect?
Michael O'Sullivan It would easily be double that if you included builders’ and architects’ fees. It’s the labour costs that kill a project.

HOME If you were a client hiring an architect, what lessons would you take from your own project?
Michael O'Sullivan Engage a quantity surveyor at the outset. As architects, we are very respectful of our clients’ budgets, but quantity surveyors have skills that we weren’t taught at architecture school.

HOME You said that you’re not generally in favour of fixed-price building contracts. Care to tell us more about that? 

Michael O'Sullivan Fixed fees can be quite stifling. There’s no suspense or element of surprise, no room for excitement. The appropriateness of different materials becomes apparent as you build – quite often the built form gives clues as to what the interior finishes should be.

Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems: the Signal Box by Melling Morse Architects

Welcome to the third in our series of Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems, which we've created to help give insight into the process of designing and building a home - and staying within budget as you do so. 

This week, we visit the Signal Box in Masterton by Melling Morse Architects. The home won our 2008 Home of the Year award. Since then, we're sad to report that Gerald Melling, who ran Melling Morse Architects with Allan Morse, has passed away. We hope this post serves as a reminder of Gerald's cleverness and the original, thoughtful homes he and Allan created together. The photographs are by Paul McCredie.

The Signal Box by Melling Morse Architects, our Home of the Year in 2008, is whimsically inspired by the signal arms of the nearby railway station.

Make no mistake: Stephanie Chilcott loves her house. “It’s really lovely – in winter, I walk in when I get home from work, and it’s usually about five degrees warmer than it is outside, all thanks to the sun,” she says. “I wanted a house designed for me, and that’s what I’ve got. I found it really rewarding”. 

Once she had purchased her site near the Masterton railway station, Stephanie’s next challenge was to find an architect. With an estimated budget of just over $200,000, she found many architectural practices wouldn’t even allow her to make an appointment to see them, as they considered her budget unrealistic. Eventually she called architects Gerald Melling and Allan Morse, creators of a number of successful low-budget homes. She found them happy to take on the project.

In the kitchen, the 'PH5' lights are by Poul Henningsen. The artwork above the sink is by Bill Hammond.

In order to save money, Stephanie decided to manage the project herself, hiring the builder on a labour-only basis and ordering many of the materials and joinery. She estimates that doing this probably saved her $50,000. Despite this, her budget blew out, requiring her to eventually spend a total of about $350,000.

There are two options Stephanie believes she should have considered at the beginning of the process. One would have been to employ a quantity surveyor at the outset of the project to provide a more rigorous estimate of how much it would cost to build Melling Morse’s design. Stephanie says had she known how much the house would end up costing, she would probably still have gone ahead with the build, but saved herself the stress of needing to refinance part-way through the process. 

The home's entry hall is a cool respite in the heat of summer. The artworks are by Gavin Chilcott.

The other option she could have considered to keep costs from blowing out would have been to employ a builder on a fixed-price contract (a fixed-price contract means the builder agrees to complete the job for a mutually agreed sum). Some architects believe fixed-price contracts are inflexible and can create tension on a building site if unforeseen complications arise that require the builder to spend extra time on the job – something that is especially common in renovations, where the condition of the original building isn’t always clear. In Stephanie’s case, she did ask two builders to quote for fixed-price contracts, and both of them estimated a price of about $350,000. Those estimates turned out to be accurate, but at the time, Stephanie was convinced she could do it cheaper, so she employed a builder on a labour-only arrangement, which means the builder charged an hourly rate for his services. 

 

In the dining area, the concrete floor and insulated block walls retain solar heat.

Is the cost blowout an architects’ problem? Not necessarily. Architecture schools don’t teach students how to estimate costs, so most architects are judging a building’s budget from their own experience, or from an estimated average square-metre cost, which can prove to be inaccurate depending on the time required to realise an unusual design. It’s worth having a frank discussion about your financial situation with your architect, but to take the pressure off, a quantity surveyor or a project manager can work on your behalf to ensure your initial estimates are accurate, and that a building project comes in as close as possible to its original estimate. Architects will also manage the building process for you, for a higher percentage of the costs.

The living room features a vintage settee by Peter Hvidt. The artwork above it is by Gavin Chilcott.

The other thing Stephanie says first-timers should be aware of is that they need to budget for costs such as GST, council fees, architects’ fees, engineer’s fees, securing a building permit, drainage fees, and so on. Architects and tradespeople generally assume a budget figure to be net costs (this is so their fee, a percentage of the build costs, is based only on the net figure) – so if you tell an architect you have a budget of $200,000, he or she will create a design up to that amount without including potential ancillary costs unless specifically directed to do so.

The bedroom in the home's "Signal Arm" is a series of stepped platforms.

Q+A with Stephanie Chilcott

HOME What would you do differently if you were to build another house? 

Stephanie Chilcott The key thing is that I would probably pay money for a quantity surveyor or go for a fixed-price build. My advice would also be to be quite direct with your architect. [A budget blowout] is a gradual process that creeps up on you. Some building costs had escalated by the time we started. I could have finished the house more cheaply on the inside, but that would have cheapened it. You’ve got to finish a house the way it was intended, but that must be a serious dilemma for lots of people. 

HOME You managed the project yourself in order to save money. Was that challenging? 

Stephanie Chilcott You don’t need special skills to manage a process like this, but you do need to be able to interpret a plan to understand a little bit about the construction process. You need a really good relationship with the builder. I offered my builder a little bit more to manage the site – he had sub-contractors he liked to use so he used them. It’s important to have a clear discussion with your builder about who’s responsible for what. You don’t want to be involved in site management, deciding when the subbies should come. You shouldn’t spend any more time on the building site than you have to, but go down there only when required. If you go there too much, you start making changes and you’ll find yourself spending more money. You have the plans, you’ve got a builder – you let them get on with it. 

A small study is located on a landing on the way up to the bedroom.

 HOME Did you enjoy the process? 

Stephanie Chilcott I found it really rewarding to watch things come into three dimensions, to watch the house grow and change. The driver for the house was I wanted something designed for myself, and that’s what I’ve got – it’s been designed for me, for how I live. The proportions of all the rooms are perfect, and that’s what you’re paying for – design skills. The house has a valuation for more than it cost to build, and it has a value above the dollar stuff because of its inherent qualities.

"It was either going to be a complete embarrassing disaster or something a bit special," said architect Gerald Melling of the home's signal arm inspiration.

Before his death, Gerald Melling formed a Wellington-based architectural partnership, Melling Architects, with his son, David Melling. David still runs the practice today. Allan Morse has his own firm, Allan Morse Architect, also based in Wellington.