Initial Concepts

The original idea was for a home with an overall european flavor. "Aged" but not "Rustic". I began by simply using the drawing tools contained in Microsoft Word to sketch out some of the ideas, this allowed me to better visualize they layout and flow of what I was wanting, and get some ideas on some of the features I felt I wanted in my Dream Home.

Courtyard: I had noticed in some of my European travels that it was common to find houses that encircled a central patio. I thought this sounded like an interesting approach, and one that would allow me to have an 'outdoor' area for the pets to frolic in, without exposing them to the hazards of nature (or man).

Dining Room: Since I consider myself an accompished 'hobbiest' cook, it was clear that both food and entertaining would be a key ingredient. So for the dining area I invisioned an expansive dining room that actually shared space with a Living Room, thus allowing the actual size of the dining area to expand into the Living Room as necessary for larger gatherings.

Library: I have an ever growing collection of books (heavily weighing in on the Cookbook side of things), and so a library of some sort was a must. I always pictured something like Henry Higgin's two story library with spiral staircase (from "My Fair Lady") as being the perfect home library, so I felt something along these lines is what I should plan for.

Aboritum: Up here in the Pacific Northwest, it is said it rains alot. It sounded like a really great idea to have a large glass enclosed room that would provide the feeling of being outdoors, yet not be exposed to the elements. In my original plans, this glass greenhouse room would span to two arms of the building on the south side of the house, thus alow more light to flow into the central courtyard during mid-day.

Lounge: These days, it is getting more and more common to have a well-integrated wet bar as part of one of the entertaining spaces. For some reason, I wanted to take this a step further and actually build a full-sized bar and cocktail lounge into the house. Beer Engine, Ice Maker, Soda Gun, Speed Rack, the whole nine yards. Ok, perhaps this is one of those little follies, but something tells me that this room will get a lot of use...

There were several other concepts that I originally was thinking of. Some of them made it in the final design, and some of them (such as the central courtyard) did not.