It’s generally Jordon who posts the architecture links around here but I saw this in Coastal Living Magazine and I couldn’t help but posting a link to the gallery of this family home designed by Steve Herlong. You can read more about the house on Coastal Living and on the Herlong Architects blog.
Over the last year a bunch of friends have asked us how we decide what to bring up and what to leave at home with such a small space to live in and store stuff in. I thought I would do a small series on outfitting the cabin and give it a category of it’s own. The first series is on lighting at the cabin.
Dorcy LED Lantern :: Sooner or later you are going to be at the cabin and you will lose your power whether you are on the grid or off the grid. Sure it may be mother nature or Sask Power’s fault but it is going to be nice to light up your cabin for a couple of hours. We have two of them. One is a kind of torch/lantern hybrid that uses 4 D batteries that Mark uses for his tent while the other one is a simple LED lantern that used 4 AA batteries. Both cost under $10.
Coleman Lantern App for the iPhone and iPod Touch :: I downloaded this free app the other day just to use it to goof around with Mark. The other night at the cabin I decide to check my e-mail and grab my iPod Touch and head to the Kinney Memorial Lodge. As I am heading over there I realize it is totally dark. Being diabetic, I don’t have the best sense of feel in my feet and have lost a bit of balance. Walking in complete darkness over uneven terrain isn’t impossible but I wasn’t enjoying it. All of a sudden I remembered this app and fired it up. It lit up the road way enough to walk comfortably and even enough to notice the family or raccoons in the trees beside me. You may not ever need to use it but if you do, it is nice to have.For our permanent light fixtures, we use five CFL bulbs over three rooms. Not only are they energy efficient, they give off some fairly unattractive light which means that we often choose not to use them. Because of the open design of the cabin, once Mark and Oliver head to bed for the night, we tend to reduce the lights as much as possible and often head outside to the gazebo or around our fire pit. Since our area of Arlington has no street lights (which is a good thing), the cabin has two mini night lights which are powered by LED bulbs. This keeps us from breaking our legs while walking around at night.
For reading on cloudy days, we have one touch lamp which provides enough light to do most everything in the cabin while not having to light it all up.
Outside in the gazebo we do have a string of low wattage ornamental lights in the gazebo but for lighting we generally choose to use candles. The cabin is also surrounded by 15 LED solar lights which not only look quite nice but are very environmentally friendly. With windows on three sides of the cabin, a lack of light is not a big issue for us. In fact that for most of the day the lights are not even a consideration.
The lighting at the cabin is in flux and will change a bit once we rewire some of the fixtures but the plan is to keep consumption as low as we can and rely as much as we can on candles and other low energy sources.
Let me know if you have any better suggestion in the comments below.
For a barbecue-ranch flavour twist, use 3 tbsp (45 mL) each barbecue sauce and ranch dressing as sandwich spread on the baguette.
Preheat barbecue to medium. Process croutons in blender or food processor until coarse crimes form. Transfer to large bowl. Add first amount of dressing and oats. Stir. Add beef. Mix well. Divide into 4 equal portions. Shape into four 4 inch diameter patties. Cook on greased grill for about 7 minutes per side until fully cooked and internal temperature reaches 160 degrees F.
Combine lettuce and second amount of dressing in medium bowl. Spoon on to bread slices. Top with patties. Makes 4 burgers.
Preheat broiler. Sprinkle both sides of steak with first amount of steak spice. Place on greased baking sheet. Broil on top rack in oven for about three minutes until desired doneness. Transfer to cutting board. Cover with foil. Let stand for 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, combine red pepper and cream cheese in small bowl. Spread on bun halves.
Thinly slice steak diagonally across the grain. Sprinkle with second amount of steak spice. Arrange beef over cream cheese mixture on each bun. Top with spinach. Set bun tops over spinach. Makes 4 sandwiches.
This was originally our old three quarter bed. We took it out of our room, painted the headboard and the footboard a light brown and moved it into the main room. It is a combination of guest bed, day bed, and if we aren’t looking, a bed for the dogs. Eventually it will be replaced by a loft above and in it’s place will be a sofa or a futon (probably a futon).
This is Mark’s day bed. You can see the skim board, kick board, and oars tucked in behind the bed. He is expected to keep his stuff neatly put away in his duffle bag and most days he is pretty good about it.
This bed’s fate will be a little different then the other one. It too will be replaced by a loft but we may keep this one.
We don’t have a lot of ornamental stuff at the lake but this old coffee grinder is one of them. While it looks like it would be great to store fresh ground coffee in it, it doesn’t seal up so it wouldn’t be fresh for very long.
Lee stuck this on the door when he came in. It is one of those vinyl stickers that is removable and we need to put it on the outside of the window.
Some light and some not so light reading. A doodle book, some politics, and some world history.
We do have a swing set in the back. It’s too old for Oliver, too young for Mark but perfect for the neighbor kids who love to play on it.
The gazebo now that we have some furniture tossed into it. Jordon strung some wicker lights through the roof and put in an outdoor carpet and small table.
Of course Maggi decided to check out the marina. Here she is trying to get back on the dock.
Well we are back from the lake for a couple of days until we go up again. Wendy had to work three shifts and until she is done on Friday, we are in Saskatoon.
We got a couple of things done while we were at the lake.
In other news…
When and if we get the cabin working the way we want it, I would love to have a tiny outdoor shower to wash the sand away and if designed correctly, be able to be used for quick showers. Coastal Living magazine has a great gallery on creating the perfect outdoor shower. While you are over on their site, make sure you check out 15 Weekend Projects and choosing your outdoor furniture wisely. Both have provided fodder for discussion and decision making around here.
10 helpful ideas from Style at Home on how to give your house or your cottage a great beach feel. While you are on their site, you may want to check out this neat feature about outdoor rooms.
Now that we have the gazebo up, a carpet ready to lay down, and some furniture all ready to go, we have started talking about a deck or a patio for the east side of the cabin. We want something small, just big enough for a bistro table and chairs so Jordon and I can sit outside and have a warm drink to start the day or a cool drink to end the day in the shade.
As we have been looking around, I was recently shown some stuff that Better Homes and Gardens has put together.
I first saw this on a Tumbleweed Tiny House design and quite liked how it looked. While I doubt we will use a Dickinson Marine Fireplace (we have a little too much space) once we insulate the cabin, I thought I would link to a good write up on using it on Cool Tools.
We live in a tiny house and love our Dickinson Marine fireplace -- it does an excellent job of heating our 105-square-foot space. Watching the flames makes things very cozy on a cold day.
We generally use our fireplace beginning sometime in November through about April, depending on the weather. It uses very little propane; I think it cost us about $40 for heating this past winter. We use the 12v built-in blower when it is particularly cold or when we are trying to heat things up quickly. But forced-air heat blows around dust, which makes me sneeze, and it is a little noisy, too, so I prefer to leave the fan off when it’s not necessary. Without the fan on the heater is very quiet. For our small space and compared with electric space heaters or even central forced-air systems, this little guy takes the cake.
You can find more information about the fireplace at Dickinson Marine. If propane is not for you, they also have a wood heater.
This comes from Apartment Therapy
You can find out more information on this luxury resort on their website.
An encampment of just 10 unique, canopied tents, Aman-i-Khás rests on the edge of Rajasthan’s Ranthambore National Park, a sanctuary for wildlife rich with cultural beauty. Remote and secluded, Aman-i-Khás is a true haven of tranquility, offering guests exceptional levels of comfort in a pristine wilderness setting. Only bird calls interrupt the day’s peace, and at night, under a magnificent star-strewn sky, the calls of the wild send guests to sleep in the safety and warmth of their king-size beds. Reminiscent of the splendid travelling tents used by the dynastic rulers of the Moghul era, the permanent tents are privately located around the camp’s central outdoor fireplace. Surrounded by cushioned, stone banquettes, the fireplace provides the camp’s focal point, as well as breathtaking vistas of the Aravalli Hills, dotted with crumbling ruins from another age.
These tents don't come cheap. Rates are listed at $875 a night for your own personal hideaway in this remote nature reserve. A lot our of our budget but what a great idea.
The house is realized on an old Japanese cherry-farm in the Datun -mountains of North-Taiwan. It is designed as a vessel to react on the demanding wind, flooding and heat conditions on the site.
The house is a stick raised above the ground in order to let the flood waters run under it. The different spaces are connected to a flexible movement within the axis of outdoor and indoor functions. The smaller bathroom and kitchen unit acts as a kicker stabilizing the wooden structure during the frequent typhoons and earthquakes.
The bio-climatic architecture is designed to catch the cool breeze from the Datun-river during the hot days and to let in the small winds circulating on the site between the fresh water reservoir pond and the farmlands. A fire place is used during the winter for heating and for cooking tea. In connection with the bathroom is a small sauna.
The house is not strong or heavy – it is weak and flexible. It is also not closing the environment out, but designed to give the farmers a needed shelter.
Ruin is when man-made has become part of nature. With this house we were looking forward to design a ruin.
More can be be found in the Architectural Review
Conceived as a meditation on the decline of Finnish rural life, the project - punningly entitled Land(e)scape - involved hoisting a trio of redundant timber barns on to spindly stilts to make them look as though they were walking out of the countryside and migrating to the city. In a final nihilistic flourish, the structures were set on fire and transformed into blazing memorials to the loss of a pastoral idyll.
Casagrande is now in partnership with Taiwanese architect Frank Chen, and together they recently completed a house in the north of Taiwan, near the Datun Mountains. Set on farmland next to a river and surrounded by tree-covered hills, the remote, rural site has echoes of the walking barns project. Yet for all its bucolic charm, the environment can be harsh, with intense heat in summer and frequent typhoon winds, compounded by periodic flooding from the river and seismic activity.
The commission came from a retired couple who wanted to leave the city and embrace a simpler, rural lifestyle, farming cherry trees and bamboo. When approached to design the house, Casagrande was living in an abandoned tea factory in the area and had become familiar with the locale.
Though climate and site conditions are challenging, he regards his design as an adaptive, responsive entity, capable of riding them out "like a boat". To protect against flooding, the house is raised above the ground on a platform, which also acts as a terrace, extending the living area. The main volume, which contains living and sleeping quarters, is a narrow, single-storey wedge, buttressed along its long, east side by a smaller structure housing a bathroom, kitchen and sauna.
The arrangement neatly demarcates served and servant spaces, but equally importantly it also enhances structural stability in the event of an earthquake, the smaller body acting to brace and support the larger one.
The roof and walls of the main volume project out at the wider north end to form a sheltered enclave for al fresco dining. The roof is also brought into play as a sun deck, accessed by an external flight of stairs.
The New York Times has 101 Simple Salads for Summer.
44. Make a crisp grilled cheese sandwich, with good bread and not too much good cheese. Let it cool, then cut into croutons. Put them on anything, but especially tomato and basil salad. This you will do forever.
The only thing cooler than a pool party on a summer night in New York City is a secret pool party.
On a rented lot that’s hidden from the street they have erected what they call a lo-fi urban country club: three connected pools housed in Dumpsters; a bocce court; some lounge chairs, grills and cabanas. On Saturday night just three dozen people got the nod to check it out, at an after party for the art journal Cabinet. “Please don’t forward,” the invitation read.
“It’s amazing,” the artist Nina Katchadourian said after taking a dip in the moonlight. “It makes you wonder, as so many things in New York do, what’s behind every wall that you can’t see past.”
Bobbing in the water on a pool toy was “the last thing I expected to be doing tonight,” added Aaron Levy, a curator visiting from Philadelphia.
What makes it so cool?
While the project is conceptually simple — get a bunch of trash containers, clean and seal them, fill with water, jump in — there were a lot of details to finesse. The coarse edges inside the containers were filed down, and underneath the liners, the bottoms were covered in sand, for soft landings. Tightly packed sandbags double as benches along the walls, and pool toys and kid-friendliness provide an intentional counterpoint to the neighborhood grit.
I don’t talk a lot about urban development on this weblog but I was intrigued by this article and the idea of creating low cost urban retreats. With the decline in major American cities and entire neighborhoods being abandoned in places like Detroit, there are going to be a lot of opportunities for creative reuses in urban centers. While I doubt that we will see secret urban party spots popping up all of the time, it’s going to be great when we do. via
A funny article From the Globe and Mail.
Then there's the Dock Depressor – the guy who brings down the mood at happy hour on the dock with a windy seminar on every apocalyptic current-affairs scenario you hoped to leave behind for a week or so. He may find himself being sent up the hill for ice to give everybody else a sunny interval between the gloom and doom.
And speaking of sunny intervals, how about the Weather Whiner? It's never hot enough, dry enough or even breezy enough for the weather grump, who complains as if the hosts are the Weather Mastahs and can immediately – poof – change that cloud pattern. Why doesn't he just run to the dock and retrieve all the towels before lightning strikes?
Which brings us to the Towel Eaters. Oops, they didn't bring their own towels. Oops, they use a minimum of three a day. Come on, guys, someone's got to wash them. Other eco-disasters include Water Hogs and Septic Skeptics – the former use too much water showering or doing the dishes, while the latter flagrantly disobey the cute hand-lettered sign that says “Don't put toilet paper in the toilet.” Let's face it, these septic-tank violators are way too anal for the relaxed hygiene standards of cottage life and are much better off being exfoliated at a very good spa.
Of course there are ways to be a good guest as well
But let's be positive – how can you be a cottage superstar? The kind that gets an auto-invite for next year before the summer is over.
Because cottages are often multigenerational hubs, one grateful host suggests that the guest who patiently sits and chats – well, listens – to elderly family members is a wonderful addition. Also warmly welcomed is the visitor who pitches in with yard work, weed whacking her way into the hostess's heart. (Although there can be an S&M dynamic to that relationship – one friend's grandmother wickedly had a guest move all the heavy rocks one year and then had him move them all back the following year.) Learn how to be a handyman hero – our friend Ed fixed my mother-in-law's dock step and now Ed can do no wrong at the family cottage. We're jealous of Ed.
Quiet sex. Few cottages are soundproof, so gratitude goes to those who must but mute the lust.
Be game for everything – a great Scrabble or Boggle player is a huge hit, particularly if he doesn't, in a moment of superiority, speedily finish off the jigsaw puzzle and then gloat about it all weekend.
Skilled parenting is also widely admired at most cottages – parents who not only prevent their own kids of any age from being pouty non-participants but even tactfully help the hosts' kids take their behaviour up a notch.
And finally, who doesn't love cottage gushers – those who genuinely develop a crush on whosever cottage they are at, who congratulate the hosts over and over again on the location, the lake, the landscaping, the loons. Most people consider their cottage a paradise on Earth. So being the angel who loves it just as much as they do means you're guaranteed a heavenly callback. Unless of course you decide in the interval that you're really not cottage material.
Jordon discovered Quiche Lorraine while in Chicago. A restaurant called Cosi makes a great one and when he got home we tracked down a recipe for it. I make the shell at home, freeze it, and then bring it up to the lake to continue making it up there. While it takes a bit of time to prepare, it is a favorite around the house.
Ingredients:
Filling:
Preparation:
Filling: In large skillet, fry bacon over medium-high heat until crisp, about 5 minutes. Drain on paper towels.
(Make-ahead: Let cool for 30 minutes. Refrigerate until cold. Cover and refrigerate for up to 24 hours. Reheat in 350°F/180°C oven for 20 minutes.)
As Wendy wrote, we have a three quarter bed at the cabin the master bedroom. I am 6’4” and the bed is just too short for me unless I am sleeping on an angle. It is also too narrow for Wendy and I. We are never comfortable and when it is cold and the dog decides to join us, someone has to get down. It’s occasionally Wendy, it’s occasionally me but for some reason it is never the dog.
Today we tied down a queen sized box spring and a pillow top mattress to the top of our 1992 Doge Caravan and drove out to the lake with them. Other than killing our fuel mileage, it wasn’t that hard to take them out. Once we got out there, we took our three quarter bed frame outside, repainted it a light brown and moved the queen sized bed inside. With the bed in the bedroom, there is about four inches between the end of the bed and the wall and three feet between the side of the bed and the wall. It is a snug fit in the room but boy is that queen sized bed going to be nice to sleep on. There is still room for a small side table and since we keep most of our clothes in a duffle bag anyways, we don’t need a lot of storage in there.
Our old bed replaced the heaviest bed frame I have ever had to lift. It took both Wendy and I to take them out to the dump. I am not sure what it was made from but it weighed a couple hundred pounds at least. It’s replacement is still a three quarter bed but at least it has some rolling casters on it and now that it is painted, it is a nice addition to our main room. It’s also a lot lighter than the other bed.
Since we were driving up, we tossed a couple of resin Adirondack chairs and some other lawn chairs in the van along with Oliver’s wagon. The chairs finish up the gazebo while the wagon means we won’t have to pack his stroller each time we go up. Of the two, Oliver prefers the wagon, largely because he isn’t strapped in. It also allows him to toss out anything in the wagon largely unnoticed as we go for walks. We have already had to send one of us back the way we came to pick up assorted pieces of clothes that somehow disappeared from the wagon.
While we were waiting for the paint to dry, we took Maggi down to the lake and all of us went for a swim. It was Oliver’s first time in the lake and he spent a bunch of time splashing around having a great old time. It was hot and humid today and to cool waters of Last Mountain Lake were a nice break from it.
From here, it was the Treat Spot for some ice cream and cold drinks. I am not sure whose idea it was to start a small ice cream stand at the lake but it was a great one.
After cleaning up, touching up some paint, and making some beds, it was time to head back home. Wendy has to work tomorrow and while it’s hard to believe, her collective bargaining agreement does not allow for “I’m at the lake and don’t want to work so pay me anyways” days.
In seven days we will be back until the end of the August Long Weekend (technically called Saskatchewan Day in these parts)
