BUILT HIS OWN HOME

Evening Star, Issue 20034, 27 November 1928, Page 2

BUILT HIS OWN HOME

NEW ZEALANDER’S ACHIEVEMENT

j. have always been rather keen on making things. An old chair made out of packing cases when 1 was a Jad at homo is still in daily use, and 1 remember a bicycle which, with its wooden wheels, fearfully and wonderfully constructed, was the talk of the countryside (writes Louis Russell, a New Zealander, in ‘Australian Homo Beautiful’). And so when 1 wauled a homo of my own and was fortunate enough to have a good deal of leisure and not too much capital, it seemed the natural tiling that 1 should try my nnnd at building it myself. Being neither an architect nor a builder, but having just set to work with my own hands as the need arose and the fancy took me, it is inevitable that my home would not win a medal at an architectural exhibition; but it expresses something of my own individuality. And that, my wife tells mo, is “unconventional” —whatever that

may mean. first as to site. I sought out a quiet spot, away from the roar of traffic, by the sea and at the foot of some hills, and here, the monarch of all I surveyed, I set to work, without let or hindrance, quietly and steadily, to build the house of my dreams—our dreams. It was war time when I began. 1 have not finished yet. Material was expensive. The best quality was not obtainable —at any rate, not at the price that I was prepared to pay. A master craftsman would have laughed at the collection of timber that 1 was able to obtain for the framing, or perhaps ho would have cried. It was weird. It had knots in it. Some of it was twisted. But I was doing the job myself, and trusted to honest building and extra precautions constructionally to make up for all these defects. The framing was all jarrah; the walls externally sheeted with fibro-cement, and internally the house was lined throughout with some of the fihrohoarding on the market. The roof was a simple one. I had fireplaces bracketed out from the walls.

As to design, I have always held to the idea of an Englishman’s home being his castle, and determined that so fains the limitations of timber construction, etc,, would permit my new house should be castle-like in one respect at least. It should he built high up, and have a bold, upstanding appearance. The main,floor, therefore, I set about Bft above the ground, which was practically level. “ Below decks ” I planned a big workshop, where I could toil unmolested; also the bathroom and washhouse.

The floor plan above was laid out to follow our requirements. There was a large sitting room, where we could, on occasion, entertain our friends, and a reasonably-sized kitchen (which for my better half was essential). It was the breakfast room also. I omitted doors wherever possible, forming the opening to the stock size, so that they could be added later if found to be necessary ; and we hung curtains at these openings. I determined that the bedrooms should be no bigger than necessary. There wore three, one each for the" boy and the girl, in addition to tho best bedroom at the front of the house. A special “music alcove” was put up, opening off the sitting room. This housed the phonograph, and onr collection of seven hundred records.

On reckoning up when this much was completed, I found that my venture had cost something in the region of four hundred pounds. Had I employed tradesmen, or charged for my own work, it would probably have been at least twice that amount. For a year or two I did not make any additions. The observant reader will notice that onr house has followed closely the trend of our various hobbies. At this first stage we were out-of-doors enthusiasts. Between ns wo played bowls and golf and croquet. Then came the phonograph stage. For a while I went wholeheartedly for birds. This called for an aviary. Then tho hobby was billiards. And for some years now I have been in tho grip of wireless. All these called for some fresh outburst of domestic architecture.

The aviary was the first venture. This has now been reconstructed. Then I made a billiard table, but no room in the house being big enough to permit of free movement around it, or to allow the spectators to sit in comfort, I spent another £22 in material for stumps, ceiling, roofing, door, etc., and carried tho side wall of the sitting room out 6ft —and lo! a commodious billiard room.

Another time I carried the verandah around the opposite side, and later 1 glassed this in. The domestic arrangements of our family, now growing np, called for the addition of a store at the rear. By now my house had been added to on three sides. Paths were laid as necessity arose. The sewerage came along and we connected. (T'adually half the area below was concreted also, the lad and I mixing the concrete and placing it in position. Then came wireless! I badly needed a “den” where I could experir.> nt. I went very deeply into the subject, and became a constructor ol sots. Now I listen in nightly on a 1 ‘seven one of several I have made.

But the den—a few waves of tbc magic wand (with a good steel hammer head on one end of it), a little more expenditure of cash, some mm hard thinking and concentration, more chips and sharings, and you have the den as it is to-day. At a shop one day I picked up some wire for 4s and made myself a radiator And, by tl.o way, 1 forgot bo state earlier, that most of the furniture I made myself—tables, dressers, wardrobes, chairs, no* 1 bedsteads. Soon the fame of my long-distaui, reception on my home-made wilder,> apparatus attracted some of the neighbours, and I found that I Had to muride a place for my audience The sun porch was right next to tut. den. It served as a place for our arm Is in the day time A few moio touches to this, some more constructing of wall seats, and there was completed an alcove for the listeners night next to what some of them facetiously call -“the studio.”-

The building of my own Home through the years has been real good fun. What amount of solid cash have I saved through, doing the work myself? An architect who inspected the property recently estimated that my house as it is to-day, extended and elongated and with the apartments below, could not be built for much short of £1,200; whereas by actual outlay, it has cost me £507 only. And what will my home be ultimately? Who knows? Certainly not l. But some day a new need will arise in our household, or a new hobby will come, and I have no doubt that the constructive; kink will rise to the occasion. My wife’s one hope is that I won’t take a fancy to collecting elephants.