Vermont Architect – Robert Swinburne

Plans are now up and for sale on one of the largest stock plan publishing houses HousePlans.com in their “exclusive architects” section!
My plan is to produce a series of similar houses increasing in scale and amenities and see how it goes. Houseplans.com is a progressive company with a good vision as to where the market is headed. They also have huge site traffic numbers. Keeping my fingers crossed. It took me forever to finish the plans and model for this first house, I suspect I am being a perfectionist again.

Here is a recent photo of my cool modernist low budget barn. I spent quite a bit of time working on work in the barn this summer. Not so much time working on the barn itself however.

here are a few pics from this morning at the Perry road project.  It is an owner-build project so it is slower than normal for those of you who have been watching.  They are currently wiring inside now.

first take on a “sweet” Vermont house design.  As usual I’m trying to do it all with this one.

Here is another steel stair I’m working on for Susan at http://greenhousevt.blogspot.com/ This model should prove to be useful.  The builder can look at it in detail using the Sketchup viewer

I do have a thing for black houses.

I really like metal siding, very sleek, low maintence, and good shadow lines.  It can almost look like tight crisp clapboards.  There is some question as to who installs; the roofer or the carpenters?  The wood above got stained dark brown and the wood around the door was stained red!

Here is a photo from a recent project with an old door hung on sliding door hardware.  I sent the client on a mission to find a cool old oversized door from a salvage yard in Vermont.  This is what he came up with.  Note also the concrete floor and the colorful slate floor and exposed hemlock ceiling joists.  All are examples of what the owners brought into the project and emphasize the success of a collaborative approach to design.

Here is the latest photo of my cool modernist barn.  I hope to have the world corporate headquarters of RobertSwinburne – Famous Architect housed out there next year.  This spare bedroom is most unprofessional.

I have been following the growing interest in prefab modern houses with growing interest.  I have been turned off by the very high cost of prefab whenever I have looked into it.  Most seem to finish out at over $200/ s.f.   The standard double wide all vinyl modular homes come in at under $70.  This is what most potential homeowners can afford on an average $50k income.  So I was pleased to see a very thorough critique of the claims made by the prefab mod house industry.

This From Jetson Green:

This article was written by Chad Ludeman, President of Philadelphia-based postgreen and developer of the much talked about 100k House.

link to the article here

The Foard Panel SIP shell is complete on the Perry Road house is complete. It is fun to start to feel the internal spaces as well as how the house relates to the site and how the windows frame the views and light.

Hey all you sleek expensive modernist architects with square toed shiny shoes and funny little glasses! Check this out. I designed this very cool steel stair out of stock pieces of steel – two C-channels and a bunch of 1 1/2″ steel angle. Lots of nuts and bolts. Add some stainless steel cable with turnbuckles and there you go! Very Erector Set. No Welding. When it is completed there will be a wooden handrail bolted on and the 2 x 12’s that were bolted in place during constructin get replaced with solid planks of cherry from a tree felled on site. I love the rich patina of raw steel.

see also Stair Porn for a larger photo

This fantastic little place is making the rounds of the press and blogs lately and normally I want to avoid re-hashing other peoples stuff but this is too good to ignore. I am simply going to set up a link to Materialicious

The Brattleboro Reformer ran an article on the Perry Road Project today “LEED-ing the Way” For those who have been keeping tabs on this project, we will be holding several open house tours during and after construction.  Stay tuned here for dates and more information.  Also my college friend Mark LePage put an entry relating to me in his new blog Entrepaneur Architect It has been interesting to watch Mark’s firm as it grows and his internet activities expand. Very inspiring, Now I am trying to inspire other classmates from architecture school to follow suit.

Here is a rendering of the Perry Road project for the press.

The ICF foundation is in and the slab goes down thursday.  The plumber is putting the drains in to the septic and roughing for a future basement bathroom. We used Nudura ICFs which have 2 1/2″ of foam inside and out.  and a footing form that stays in place as a footing drain inside and out.  We are putting 4″ of foam under the slab and radiant tubing in the slab (in case we need it someday)

We broke ground last Friday and quickly discovered ledge. Read more »

The ferns are unfurling around the fern house, our seasonal guest sleeping / napping spot

The bed is a futon on a slatted frame hung from the structure on parachute cord.  The entire project took about forty hours and $700 or $800 bucks a few years ago.  Mostly just 2 x 4’s , 2 x 6’s polycarbonate roofing and charcoal coated metal screen.  I will try to get some better pics up on the website.  www.swinburnearchitect.com

Yes, it’s official as of this morning although some of you have known since Friday. Read more »

With a title like this I’ll probably get lots of google hits and lots of spam. An interesting note: We had intended to use composting toilets in the Perry Road Project but in Vermont this allows you to reduce the size of the leech field by only 25%. They also require you to have the septic folks take your compost away every year. Another factor in our decision not to use composting toilets is the cost. This is a very low budget house and composting toilets are pretty pricey. We will probably go with Toto low flow toilets. These have a very good reputation.

okay, enough talk, lets see pictures. This is a house that I have just finished tuning and tweaking. Construction will start next month. see my website for more information. We may set up an independant blog for this project. We are going for LEED certification and of course, Energy Star. We are pushing the low cost limits as well. I designed it so that the owners can do most of the labor without getting into too much time and complexity. Materials and subs costs are coming in at a little over $50 per square foot not including site work, well and septic. The shell is made of structural insulated panels from Foard Panel.

Oh, and of course, being in Vermont, there is a sleeping porch.