When it comes to designing your own home, how do you go about choosing your house style? Clearly, when it comes to a self-build, there is a huge choice of looks to go for. However, they can be broadly divided into three basic types: traditional, contemporary or a mixture of traditional and modern.
The ‘Grand Designs’ contemporary look
The ‘Grand Designs’ type of custom built house often looks like an extremely eye-catching, brightly coloured aluminium construction. This can often turn out to be the most expensive kind of design for a self-build home. A grand design means a high build cost. According to one of our architects, Russell Baker, this is because the detailing has to be so incredibly precise to look good. Russell says, “Achieving that look is often highly complex. There’s no doubt too that these homes are often rather Marmite – for every person who loves it, there will be someone who really hates it too! While many of us may admire the design, it can be quite hard to imagine living in it.”
Traditional
Traditional architecture is very often favoured over more contemporary styles. Many traditional brick-built houses are hundreds of years old and have blended in completely to become part of the landscape. This ‘traditional’ house design has certainly proven its aesthetic worth over several centuries. It can be hard to pinpoint exactly why it has stood the test of time so well. Perhaps it is because it creates a feeling of warmth and cosiness, both of which are very important in our damp, mild climate. It often also captures a sense of a nostalgic rural idyll, a throwback to pre-Industrial Revolution times.
Many of our self-build projects are built in the traditional style of a cottage, farmhouse, barn or Georgian house. These styles look instantly familiar to us.
Russell points out that, when choosing your house style, embracing traditional design doesn’t mean you can’t be thoroughly modern too when you are building your own home. He says,
“We can add modern touches but still make sure the design looks authentic. For example, we design the windows to be much bigger than in old houses, so they let in far more natural light. We can make sure that traditional design, like a detailed oak porch, is featured on the front of the house but the back of the house can still benefit from extensive glazing overlooking the rear garden and a lovely, spacious open plan kitchen-dining room that runs across the back of the whole house. “Renewable energy sources and green technologies can be incorporated too. These are all entirely modern concepts but they can still work really well in a very seemingly traditional style of house.”
‘Hybrid’ homes
The third style of house design is what we call ‘hybrid’. This has a much more modern feel and quite a different appearance from the traditional build. Nevertheless, it still has what we think of as a conventional property shape, with a pitched roof. However, it will probably be built with more modern wall finishes and window style and maybe a larger roof overhang. Exterior wall finishes may include a more modern brick, through coloured synthetic render or timber cladding, which are broken in to distinct panels along the vertical or horizontal lines that the building shape creates. These hybrid houses have a much more contemporary feel than the cottage or farmhouse look but are still conventional to build. This means that they are not much more expensive for a self-builder, despite the aesthetic differences.
Cost versus design
It is important to understand that your build costs will be largely dictated by the design of your self-build home. Our team will advise you on how to design to your budget to avoid overspending or having to cut back on costs by modifying your plans further down the line, which is expensive and time-consuming.
Why work with CB Homes when you build your own house?
CB Homes’ fixed fee, turnkey self-build package includes design meetings with our architect and all the architect’s drawings, which usually comprise two floor plans as well as details of the front and rear elevations of your self-build.
If you are interested in a self-build, talk to us, without obligation, to see how we can help you and make sure that you end up choosing a house style you love that fits your budget.
