Despite the parish council voting against the proposal for 31 houses on the land behind Silver Spray, Cornwall Council have voted 10-3 in favour of the development – with conditions.
Tescan Ltd has been granted outline planning permission for a mix of private and affordable homes, including an eco-style subterranean luxury house built into the side of the cliff, that campaigners claimed would be worth more than £2 million.
As reported in the local newspaper, the West Britton:
Following comments by many Perranporth residents and visitors that the beach was getting in a state, a number of locals used the “Please listen Perranporth Parish Council” Facebook group to short circuit officialdom and self organise a beach clean last Saturday.
With less than 48 hours notice a Facebook event was created and over a dozen people turned up, with their own gloves and bin bags. The participants included Councillor Dave Webster, the local vet, several dogs, children and adults who walking the length of the main beach at high and low tide marks, rapidly filled over a dozen large rubbish bags. One of the ‘finds’ was an enormous fishing net which was pulled, virtually hidden, from the sand.
We popped into the Watering Hole to ask if they were OK for us to put the collected rubbish in their big bins. To which we had a fantastic “Yes, no problem and let me get you guys a drink as a thank you”.
A fun and a fantastic example of the local community solving local problems. Hopefully by keeping the beach clean (the rubbish was mostly items brought in by the sea), it encourages visitors to enjoy the beach and keep it in a good state for others to enjoy.
According to the Feb 2012 edition of “House & Garden”:
The average British household uses a whopping 57 percent of it’s energy consumption on space-heating, and a further 24 percent on water-heating ….
I hope / suspect this figure is coming down as the “low hanging fruit” of people putting better insulation in existing housing stock and better insulation and seals etc. into new housing stock.
Architect Rob has said the house won’t need to be 100% a steel framework.
– Some steel given the spans is likely. But Rob says even on such an exposed site, other building materials can give a solid, non flexing building.
The spotted a magazine article about a house built on a sloop in some woods, talked about Pavatex Pavatherm in the “Eco Credentials” section of the article:
…. eco-friendly Pavatex Pavatherm Plus interlocking wood-fibre insulation boards, which we used to clad the roof and first floor ……. This made a waterproof sealed skin on the outside of the frame.
Looking at their UK reseller it’s made almost 100% from recycled materials, has good thermal and acoustic insulation properties and can be combined with a light steel frame system:
So, this could be an interesting material to consider at some point. But a long way from that!
– still working on the layout of the rooms etc !
I was talking to Malcom who built the end house and he said his top tip would be to not only “over spec” any windows and doors that face the sea, but also to make sure that they are installed in a way that when it’s windy the external weather pushes them tighter shut, rather than blowing them to create a gap through which wind +/or water can come.
He has since sold the house, but when he lived in it, he said you could see the windows flexing inward when there were strong winds and you could see and feel the whole house flexing. It was a timber frame construction and in order to keep as airtight a house as possible, this re-enforces the idea of going for brick or a steel frame.
A steel frame could then have panels between the steel made with wood, and sheeps wool or similar insulation to off-set some or all of the CO2 impact of the steel and other less eco building materials. The steel frame could be in such a way that, when the house is altered or taken down, it can be taken apart and recycled.
A great article on the BBC Website on “saving money through home energy efficiency“that includes this graphic from the Energy Saving Trust on where most heat loss occurs from an uninsulated home:
For me, key is that for most existing houses, this means that double glazing is not the first thing that should be dealt with. In order the heat loss is:
So in terms of which are easy to deal with, roof insulation, cavity insulate the walls, thick curtains have been shown to give as good as double glazing (or VERY close) and then general draughts.
This is a follow on from posts about perhaps constructing the house with a steel (and not wood) frame to give better rigidity, given the exceptionally exposed site location.
Alan at Adaptahaus have got back that yes, we could work with them to:
So it looks VERY interesting and something we should come back to as we move the project along.
I don’t like the in floor coverings to the channels as per the picture below:
So I asked about this and got the reply that:
Thanks for your reply and, yes, the floor covering can be continuous. That is what I have suggested in the proposed build procedure. The conduit access throughout the building would give good access for a speedy installation of the services but all the finished floors would be laid over the covered over conduits once the services were installed.
Some more photos for ideas for where coats, boots, shoes etc. can be stored.
This idea has evolved into a room for coats, shoes etc.
and this shot (below) is more if a dedicated room for this storage:
and another one:
Create a fire side seating (snoozing) with a view nook ?
With the latest layout / design ideas in from architect Rob, this could either go below the wall from the dining area (to the right of the fire as you look at it), or to the left of the fire and so surrounded by glass and closer to the view.
This could fit in well with the idea of a glass corner and the other fire place posts.
