Town planning for Talbot

I was looking at the Central Goldfields Shire website today for info about the planning rules and discovered a mention of Talbot in their news. Woohoo!

Apparently they are in the midst of an "Urban Design Framework" review. I'm not sure what it means, other than that I would guess there is a chance we might see some upgrading of infrastructure as a result. It's also a signal of how much it is growing: I presume they wouldn't invest in a 6 month long review otherwise.

It looks like they have finished the initial analysis of opportunities - will update as I learn more. Very exciting. :-)



The image above is a screengrab from the announcement. I couldn't resist posting as it has some cute photos of the current town. You can see the full announcement including links to download the PDFs here.

Our house in miniature

Ta da... The first sighting of the model for the new house which is currently winging its way across the oceans to us.



I'll take more photos from every angle when it arrives but couldn't resist sharing this sneak preview.

I love it. :-)

hello to neighbouring bloggers

So the world is a small place. I've just stumbled over a site by some other folk building a house not far from ours... who ironically enough come from the UK originally. Perhaps the Talbot vortex really does have some magic to it...

Anyway, hello Colin & Alex, and good luck with your house (de)construction. :-)

A flurry of activity

The past week has seen a lot of activity relating to Amherst but it's of the frustrating kind, as currently there's little to show for it. In brief:

• Eric finished the scale model of the new house and is planning to post it over next week. He also sent the plans to a second structural engineer to solicit a quote, given that the first guy he sent them to hadn't yet responded.
  
  
• On Friday Dad met with Norm from the Central Goldfields planning department to get the ball rolling on applications. He's applied for the building permit for the old house, and got the forms for the planning permit which will be needed for the new one.

• While up there, Dad also met with a local guy called Mr McKay, a local building surveyor and engineer who was recommended by the council, to commission detailed soil tests. Apparently he'll take soil samples from 7 sites and it will be around 2 weeks before the tests are made. We need two reports done: a Land Capability Assessment and a Soil test for Foundations.

• Dad made contact with the guys at Septech. Once we have the soil test results and the detailed site plan, they will visit the site and prepare a quote. Once we sign off on it, they'll then prepare the documents needed to get the sewerage treatment permit from the Council, which is required as part of the planning permit application.
  
  
• Dad has arranged alternate storage facilities for all the furniture and architectural salvage odds and ends we've been sending back. Until now they've been kept in my old bedroom but the next shipment is about to arrive and there's no more space - and besides, Dad & Vida need their room back. Dad got a decent deal on a 4 x 3 m room at Storage King in Mitcham, so in the short-term we'll be moving it there. Ultimately however, Dad is looking into the cost of getting another container up at Amherst. His idea would be to put a temporary roof with insulation over the top to help keep the heat down, then it would be secure dry storage for all but the most heat-sensitive items.
  

latest floorplans for the new house

It's floorplans galore at the moment. Hot on the heels of *finally* getting the finished plans for the cottage, after nearly a year's hiatus we now have revised plans for the dream house being built next door.

Here's roughly how it all fits together, with the cottage and dream house - along hopefully with a shed for Dave - helping to create an almost fully enclosed "secret garden" area. We're doing up the cottage first to live in before starting on the dream house:




Now focusing on the dream house...

Here's the ground floor:



The Study will double as a Dining Room for big occasions like Christmas.

The Study/Reading room wing is now bigger and more clearly separated into rooms. We did this partly to get extra wall space for bookshelves, and partly to make it easier to convert to a bedroom, if God forbid we ever had to sell or found ourselves incapacitated and unable to sleep upstairs. I'm still not 100% certain on the placement of the doorway between the study and reading room though.


Here's the second floor:



The dressing room is much bigger - it's now a proper room rather than a large walk in closet. It's also had the positive side effect of making the bathroom bigger too. :-)

In case you're wondering why only one bathroom and not ensuites... This was a deliberate choice. Should we ever have to sell, the configuration is such it would be easy to add/convert to ensuites. But, for us we didn't see the point in sacrificing space to multiple bathrooms that we'd never use.

The other major change is the addition of the front upstairs terrace that Pete suggested, accessible by climbing out the window. I want to make the windows with big sills so you can prop a cushion on them and sit half in the room, half out.

And of course, the upstairs storey of the reading room.


Finally, here's the various profile views:

North: looking down the hill towards the dam and orchard:



West: this is the view you'll see as you get to the end of the driveway, thus arguably this could be considered the "front". I love the way the profile looks now with the tower in.



South: this is the view from standing midway in the 'secret garden'. It's not complete because it doesn't have the tower shown, but you can imagine the shape. I love how the bath will be in the upstairs bay overlooking this.



East: there are two versions of this, first what you'd see from the outside:



and second, a kind of cross section view of it:

latest cottage floorplans

Da da... we have more floorplans. The only difference from the previous set is the addition of the profile drawings at the top showing the view from all 4 sides. I really like it, so unless Dad finds something that needs to change, we're now *almost* ready to go ahead with permit applications. At last!!!

New vs existing floor plans:




Profile drawings of the house:

Ebay win: Victorian plant stands

Anyone who's read my post about the iron gallery at the V&A will know I love wrought iron.

It's so hard to find nice pieces of metalwork these days that don't cost a fortune, so when I saw these planters come up on Ebay I couldn't resist. Even better it turned out they were just up the road from Mum's house, so collection was not a hassle. That's fate. :-)



From the Ebay description:

These Victorian Metal Plant Stands were purchased from an estate auction of furniture from a large Victorian homestead in NSW approx 15 yrs ago. ...

Both the planters are complete, however, one does need to have an underneath section re-welded, but the part is complete & unbroken, just the join has come adrift. Although not in pristine condition (see photos) they are original & haven't been touched. There is surface rust present & discolouration of the metal due to age &/or weather. I'm definitely not an expert & I'm not sure what type of metal it is, but I'd guess cast iron or similar, as they are quite heavy for their size.

In all my travels to auctions, antiques shops, antique fairs, clearing sales etc, I've only ever seen one other pair. These had been painted & repaired, but the price was astronomical - well over $2,000. I have no doubt that someone with a bit of knowledge & time could do these planters up beautifully & make more than a tidy profit if they wished, but due to illness & time constraints, I'm sadly unable to do so myself... Anyway, my loss is your gain! Enjoy owning a piece of history!

Measurements are as follows: 80cm H x 31.5cm across the top x 95cm circumference at the widest point.

Here's some more photos showing the detailing. I quite like the rust and colouring - it shows they've had a life - so any repairs we do will be with a very light touch and structural only or to stop further deterioration. I'm not intending to paint them.

water bottles for trees

Both Dave and my birthdays are coming up in April, and Mum asked what present we wanted. So, I immediately thought of Amherst and suggested a lemon tree for the orchard.

But of course, lemon trees need a lot of water, far more than the others in the orchard. So I came up with an ingenious solution. Why not give any ultra-thirsty trees their own little water butts set on a drip feed going right under the soil? It wouldn't be lost to evaporation that way and they'd be able to have as much water as they wanted then provided the water butts were big enough.

I looked on Ebay and - tada - the perfect solution. Old olive barrels already fitted up with taps and in a fetching terracotta colour that won't look too out of place:



This is the description from Ebay:

This 190L Rainwater/Greywater barrel has a brand new 1/2 inch garden tap fitted. It is ideal to store water for the garden. It features an open top 2 piece lid . The lid has a hole in the centre and it and comes with a sink plug to stop the mozzies from getting in. In a former life this drum held olives and I have rinsed and leak tested it. The drum after rinsing retains a slight smell of olives but this will go in time.

During Melbourne's recent rain, using these type of drum/ tanks I caught 700 litres of water off a 6m x 4m shed. I then used the water to wash clothes and used the greywater to water the garden. This drum could also be used to catch the water dripping from your air conditioner or you could catch the overflow from your rainwater tank.

Tank Size approx 900 x 550mm.
Lid size 320mm diameter

We bought three of them and Mum liked them so much she bought two more for herself. I plan to just prop them up on bricks next to each tree that needs extra cosseting, they'll look quite cute. :-)