Sketchup Design Again

Back at it again. I kept messing with the previous design and found it looked less and less castle-like the more I tweaked it. Some parts of it looked good, the rest didn't, and no matter what I did I couldn't find a way to make it look good. With this design I backed off and made it simpler in some ways and more complex in others. I reduced the half-timber overhang and timber ends, made the port cochere square, and tried to make it look a little more like 2 separate buildings, a gate house and castle. Overall it's smaller as well, giving it a less massive and more cozy feel. As usual, I'll work with it until it works or I get sick of it, and comments are always welcome.

Property visit

We drove out to the land to check up on things (can't do it as often as we'd like, it costs a bundle in time, fuel and tolls) and had a look around. After signing the papers last year, we placed several signs of the "No Trespassing" variety on the roadside perimeter just as a CYA precaution. Oddly enough, upon our return visit, the signs were gone! Not cracked with pieces hanging on, but removed - along with the fasteners too.

Still working on designs for the house, all recent versions have wound up in the trash bin.

A fellow Sketch-upper and cement caster

Found this blog while digging through the Google analysis for this site. One of the referred sites was this Centerstone, so I paid it a visit. Seems the author is a fellow "Sketch-upper" and is also doing something I definitely plan on doing: Making cement molds for decorative "stonework". Check it out, looks pretty interesting and you can learn something.

A bit on the pricey side

Submitted the design to an architect/designer, and discovered that the price will be in the vicinity of $500,000 and upwards for building. That's not going to work; way, way too high. Of course this assumes contract labor, ashlar stone facade, etc... So one could reasonably cut a chunk of the cost of labor off of the price and soem of the materials, but all the same, even after that it might be too high. We'll have to see how much a basic CMU design will cost, with us doing everything else. If we can't get it down to a more reasonable price, I might have to strike my own site from the rolls!

Unknown Adirondack owner built castle for sale?

A reader stopped by and commented that she'd found this castle online for sale. It looks like a great deal of the external structure has already been done, though the fate of the castle could go either way at this stage, ruin or Camelot. Looks like a lot of those castles in various stages of disrepair scattered around Western European countries. Maybe someone will rescue it? I'll contact the agent when I have some time and see if there's any additional information on the project.

Thanks for stopping by and leaving the comment, Janet!

UPDATE: I wrote to the real estate agency via the website and have not received a response. Sorry folks. If I do get a response, I'll be sure to post it.

Still working on a design

Yet another modified version of the design I've been trying to bring to life. I've done my best to try to balance things out a bit, but there are some consistency issues to work out. One if the features is starting to irritate me slightly, the port cochere; the building front looks really large with it, but it takes a big chunk out of the ground floor space. It makes it a little difficult to get the best use out of the area provided, but of course the second floor over everything is very usable.

As in the previous model, the building at the back corner is for use as a mother-in-law, possibly as a small B&B area later, and perhaps as an apartment for us as we age and rent the main house out.

The greenhouse is attached to the kitchen, hopefully it can be utilized as a sun room and the heat generated from it can be used to warm the house in the spring and fall - along with some nice evacuated tube solar heating in the winter.

Anyway, the main work at this point is door and window placement, figuring out how to arrange rooms and cleaning the model up. Then to find an architect and hope he/she doesn't wind up "ROFL" and telling me to try something that won't cost $2M. (The building isn't that large! 2,200 s.f.!)

NPR site featuring a few American Castles

Found this when looking for more castles online. They did interviews with a couple of modern castle builders, specifically Roznik's Castle and Bull Run Castle, and have a clickable map made up with a few castles in it.

Some slightly discouraging information though, I did find out that the stonework on Roznik's Castle was $600,000. Hmm. Half-timber and shingle styles are looking a lot more attractive!

Another castle for sale

Not modern (in the sense of this site), but interesting nonetheless. Lyon's Castle in California is for sale.

A good castle story

This isn't by any means a modern castle, but I thought it was good to see that a castle that was going to ruin got some attention. Kimball Castle is in New Hampshire on Lake Winnipesaukee, and according to some of the comments on Youtube, has been purchased by a motorcycle shop and is being worked on.

Posting

I guess this is mostly an administrative issue, but I gotta apologize to readers that may wish to post who are not registered. I've received a lot of spam lately so I've had to shut off the ability to accept anonymous comments thanks to the hawkers of viagra, suspect stocks and whatever else is out there that is clogging up the moderated comments box. So, for now anyway, comments will require a Google or OpenID account.