Sunday, 20 February 2011

The house also has a door

The main door of the house has also been put into place. It's made of solid pine-wood and it will have a stained glass window in the middle (where the white patch is now).











Sunday, 6 February 2011

Installing concrete paving slabs

As Joseba was installing the windows and the electricians and the painters were working inside, Juantxo and his crew started to install the concrete paving slabs around the house.



The small wall sorrounding the terrace is still under construction. It's finish will also be white, as the rest of the house.







In the beginning we'd planned of having some pattern printed concrete on the terraces and on the sidewalks and so it was budgeted. But Juantxo has never been so fond of this kind of finish (he's had a bad experience in his own house) so he suggested that we visited a company he knew close to Vitoria where they had some building material leftovers from some other urbanization works. And there we found the concrete paving slabs that he's installing now on the sidewalks and the terraces.





We're glad that we changed because this slabs look clearly better than the stamped concrete. And they're quite cheaper as well!!!

For the rest of the patio and the carpark area we'll go for continuous deactivated concrete paving. But we'll talk about it in another moment.

Monday, 31 January 2011

We've got windows and doors

Joseba has finally installed all the windows and doors, except at the entrance and the wintergarden.

He's used a high-performance solar control glass that specializes in blocking heat. It has a more reflective appearance and the lowest solar heat gain. They aren't completely transparent - they have a greyish colour and create a mirror effect - and will protect the house from getting too hot in summer.





But all that protection and heat control comes at a price: the light transmission rate of this glass is about 30%. That means that it will take quite a lot of the light coming in through the windows, so we've finally decided to paint all the walls also in white.