Here we present the basic information on the planned design for the home. This page will feature the detailed illustrations of the home design and representations of its blueprints. At this stage things are very preliminary as I've not yet gained the aid of any architects for this project. But the simple rendering shown below illustrates the basic concept.

This design concept is based on the example of Phillip Johnson's famous Glass House in Connecticut, which can be seen here;

Plan drawings comparing this concept to Johnson House can be seen here;

Glass House plan - dimensions approximate

T-Block Pavilion plan

The primary differences here are the choice of structural material -in this case ferro-cement with an optional textile block decoration as opposed to the steel frame of the Glass House- the wide roof overhang, and the central location of the bathroom enclosure. The key virtue of this design concept is that it reduces the home to its basic elements within an open plan space. The potential savings in construction cost from this approach is great, though never actually realized in the Johnson house due to the elaborate fabrication of its custom steel frame. Note that this layout also approximates the dimensions of several off-the-shelf prefab park shelter structures which would differe chiefly in that they are made with steel and feature a hip-roof.

Many variations on this basic concept are possible by virtue of the lack of walls. Here, for instance, I organize the room zones so that the living room lounge and office spaces flank each other and the kitchen counter is integrated into the central bathroom enclosure.

The advantage with this layout is that this proximity of office to lounge allows personal computer hardware to perform double-duty as a home entertainment system.

In another variation one can arrange the home in a linear pattern, thus reducing the clear span demanded of the pavilion structure;

With this approach basic room zones are defined by a series of cabinet/shelf units as opposed to the centralized enclosure of the previous designs. Such linear arrangements are common in Modernist pavilion homes with the 'line' of the home organized as a straight or curved line line, 'L' shapes, 'S' shapes, 'Z' shapes, and atrium centered enclosures in the 'villa' style. If we fold this line on itself we get another variation demonstrated by the Simplicity design I described in my Gallery article on pavilion architecture;

Here we see the central bathroom enclosure of the Glass House transformed into a 'supercabinet' that bifurcates the layout of the home while providing a massive storage system, a centralized utilities core, and a means to conceal two of the structural supports for the pavilion.

It seems to be something of a toss-up at the moment as to which of these layout concepts would be the most economical. The more direct variant of the Glass House has the advantage of the least amount of cabinet structure and the most clear-spac space. But it demands a very large span capability for the structure, since the central enclosure itself may have no load bearing capacity as was probably the case in the masonry-based bathroom enclosure of the Glass House. The Simplicity design offers the most storage space but the most overhead in construction for its central supercabinet. The linear approach needs many smaller cabinet units but demands less of the structure. It has less storage space as well.

So these are the basic design concepts under consideration at the moment. Hopefully I will soon see some feedback on them.