Calm Living Homes

Your home design ideas

One of the things we really enjoy is using our 40+ years of building experience to give you creative ownership of the final look of your home through working with some of your design ideas.

The obvious advantages of this, is that there is no salesperson with a hidden agenda, no estimator and no architect. When we work together as the architect, not only will you have the pleasure of direct input but you will save money. You can then put that money back into your build or put it in the bank.

This is also the most cost effective way to end up with a home that you want and to see some of your design ideas brought to life.

Anton, as a Comprehensive Building Analyst and Advisor can provide guidance that can extend to any level you like, right down to helping you create particular interior moods.

That might mean knowing how the light works at different times of the day and how a room’s temperature will be affected in different seasons. It could mean planning natural light to show the natural beauty of a piece of timber, or a piece of stone, at a particular time of day. What ever you are looking to achieve, we can guide you on the possibilities and work with you to create the mood you that best suits your need – calm or excitement, modernist or heritage within a home that has its own unique identity.

If you are undertaking a renovation, creating that right mood can often mean keeping what you love about your home. We can help you with design ideas to update and improve its liveability and functionality while actually enhancing its original charm.

When it comes to the question of whether to knock down your home or to renovate it we can help there too.

That choice is not always straightforward from a money perspective. On occasions, we have rescued homes that looked like they were beyond rescue, with stunning and money saving results. Other times, you need to make a clean start, to get what you want.

We can also bring new possibilities to the table that you might not have considered. For example…

• Design ideas involving the use of stone and other finishes (such as white in your kitchen) that will not date.
• Use of ambient earth temperature to maintain a comfortable year round temperature with no, or minimal, energy input.
• Sealed windows, pollen filters and mechanical ventilation for energy efficiency, low VOC’s and allergy free fresh air to every part of your home.
• Using interior design and insulation to allow separate, controllable, temperature zones within your home.
• Indoor gardens, for aesthetics and oxygen.
• Use of a heat exchanger to minimize or eliminate the energy used to heat or cool air.
• The latest materials for durability and insulation. For example, Formcraft (insulated concrete forms) is only 10 – 15% more expensive than conventional construction methods but has outstanding energy performance, superior strength and durability and requires virtually no maintenance. It also delivers paybacks on energy savings that start on day one and last for the life of the house.
• The right proportion of spaces for their function. You can look at it on paper but knowing how it will really look in real life takes experience and even modelling does not completely replace this.

At Calm Living homes we will not only to give you a unique home, but one that is future proofed for your living pleasure, retention of value and low running costs.