Twenty years to the point of building on our own
It took a long run of other people’s projects before Wood Design & Carpentry took on new homes as principal contractor. The team keeps training current, and it still uses the methods that have already proved themselves on site. We are members of the Federation of Master Builders and of the Consumer Code for New Homes, and new-build work can carry an insurance-backed guarantee.
A new house can include almost anything planning will allow. The useful part of the early conversations is deciding what you actually want, and what the site will and will not forgive. A sloping plot changes the foundations. A ridge-height limit, as at Tre’n Vownder in Truro, can mean a sedum roof instead of a conventional pitch. Settle those choices before the build, with your architect. Changing them later costs more.
Low energy, planned in from the slab
Tre’n Vownder was our first solo new house: insulated concrete formwork on an insulated slab, finished in nine months, with an A energy rating and an air-permeability result of just over 1. At Treglos, Constantine Bay, the houses use air-source underfloor heating and MVHR. At Southpark Road, a rebuild gained solar, an air-source heat pump and battery storage.
Where it suits the plot we also plan for ground-source heat and for the generation and storage schemes available at the time of the build. The fabric comes first: airtightness, insulation, and a shell that will still make sense when the technology in the plant room is replaced.
One contractor for the whole house
On The Meadows at St Merryn we were principal contractor and site managers for five houses designed with Atec Design. We made the glass balconies, with the structural calculations, and fitted Leicht kitchens, Porcelanosa tiles and Roca and Grohe sanitaryware. Roofing there carries a 25-year insurance-backed guarantee, and the structure ten years.
Kitchens, staircases and external works stay with the same team wherever we can. If you want a larger kitchen because the dining room has gone out of daily use, that is designed with the plan, not added as an afterthought. A room that starts as a playroom can later become a study, a studio or a gym. We can come back for that when the time comes.
