More on the cottage verandah

We'd previously promised Dad we'd get back to him with more details on the verandah post design for the old house, aka the cottage, and an idea for the gable.

Here is what we came up with, in Dave's words.


Here's a sketch of the front door side (East):




It shows the use of a gable over the front door area. Not really sure what pitch the roof of the gable is to be, but it needs to stick up a little bit. There is a little canopy over the bedroom window but no verandah. Also you can see from this sketch that, if possible, Lyn doesn't want a bannister in the section in front of the lounge window. (If that means we have to get creative and add an extra long 'step' or something to meet requirements of minimum drop, so be it, but Lyn is keen that there is at least a small section of verandah she can sit on the edge of and look out with unimpeded view).

This next picture is a rough sketch showing the front door and gable/verandah in closer view. You'll see the verandah posts have big pillars at their bottom... more on this later.




Now look at this next picture which shows the side view of the house (North).



You can see the arrangement with the steps leading directly opposite the french doors. There are thick (pillared bottomed), and thin verandah posts. More on that later. Note the roofline matches at each end.

Now look at this picture which shows the back of the house (West).



Note that the steps now come out sideways, with the house on one side, rather than straight out the back. As there is no verandah here, we have put sunshades over windows, and also a small canopy over the back door/laundry door.

A closer-up view of the backdoor canopy is shown in this next picture. Note that there is no pillar to hold it up, it is supported by being joined on two sides to the building.




This next picture gives the overall view as to where the steps are, and which way they go, plus where 'big' and little' pillars go.



All the posts are roughly in the location Lyn wants them. May need to be some final adjustments here and there, but the principle is that even though they are not symmetrical in terms of precise measurements between posts, they appear nice to the eye because they're balanced & in line with other features. Most importantly, there are no pillars in front of doors and windows.

Finally, look at the pictures of the pillars that we mocked up in SketchUp. These show the styling of big pillars Lyn would like to have.



Each has the fat bottom part and then 3 smaller pillars up, then topped with some kind of 'fat' section to finish it off. The thin pillars are just a single pillar of size like the posts you used before, topped with the same 'fat' section. The idea is to have these 'fat sections' at the top of all posts that serve to tie it all together, and thus avoid the need to have a freize.

We aren't sure how to make the pillars, but think of californian bungalow type except square not tapered. I think they are probably not the norm for Australia but they seem to be like a kind of verandah posts that the house would have probably had were it built in America during that period. (So long as it looks good together and is consistent in terms of broad heritage, Lyn doesn't mind if it is American rather than Australian influenced!)

The fat bottom bit (large squarish box) are usually brick I think, but does that make it impossible to build because of height from floor to ground? If so, perhaps we could get creative in terms of building them hollow and putting cladding on or something. We aren't sure yet what the pillars would be covered with, ultimately... Lyn is toying with the idea of weatherboards, or, if they are brick, then rendering ala california bungalow style.

In terms of the smaller posts, we aren't sure as yet regarding degree of decoration, but they'd need an edge routing. Something we can sort out perhaps when we see a set of edging patterns.