Take this faux European design and shove it!

Kelli and I are doing some long-range planning for our housing. Our plan, crazy as it sounds to some, is to pay off all of our debts, then save up a substantial down payment for a lot. Eventually, we will build on that lot, hopefully a home that we design ourselves.

We've got our eyes on a 20±acre estate lot in the Sterrett/Vandiver area. That would allow us to have horses, which would then cause Savannah to have some sort of fit. I'd really like to build a green house (as opposed to a greenhouse) that is environmentally friendly, low in chemical off-gassing (Cooper and I can handle all the off-gassing, thank you,) built primarily of renewable and recycled materials and with a cool, modern design.

I get aggravated with all of these subdivisions and their covenants. I know they are designed to maintain a certain level of aesthetic beauty, cleanliness, architectural continuity and general non-white-trashiness. I can understand that. Nobody wants some alcoholic with a dozen broken-down old cars in the back yard parked around a dilapidated tin shed cum chicken coop. Believe me, I know. That pretty much describes our next door neighbor when I was growing up. But I have a disrespect for authority, and someone else's continuity is my totalitarian uniformity.

Plus, architecture has always evolved based upon available technology. That being the case, why does everyone want a house that looks like it was built 200 years ago? Traditional homes and building methods result in huge amounts of construction waste which crowd our landfills and push up housing costs. And they're often boring. Look at the house we're in -- it's just a cracker box turned on end with some brick slapped on the front. There's a difference between simplicity of design and lack of design.

To that end, check out these sites that feature some pretty innovative, modern design styles:

Live Modern
FabPrefab
the weeHouse
glide house
And for those of you who need to fit a house in a very small space, the micro compact home.

Category:

• Fustian
• Fun