DIY BLOG - The Old Kitchen
The reasons for stripping out the Old Kitchen next escape me - I think the feeling of moving onto a similar sized space made sense, as well as addressing another area that was suffering from damp.
This part of the house was the first extension made to the original croft house - I don’t have the exact date but it would’ve been around the 1950’s, just prior to the front rooms. The construction of this extension was no different to the rest of the old house but with a couple of small surprises: the timber suspended floor was propped up on the dirt with slate and, in places, timber, which had inevitably rotted away - additionally, there was a portion of concrete floor which a portion of the timber floor was bearing down on to; the plasterboard linings were fixed directly to the original tongue and groove linings, in turn fixed upon horizontal battens onto timber ‘dooks’, cast into the poured concrete walls; the ceiling was lined beyond the eaves on the angle of the pitch of the roof and then on the horizontal to the underside of the timber ties, again plasterboard fixed directly to tongue and groove lining.
Above: The work ahead. Right: The approach from the access track - the old kitchen is the portion of the house left of the red phone box, with steps leading down to the visible window…
The existing layout (above, left), though not the original layout, shows the kitchen and dining room with access to an entrance hall in the top left and through to a living room top centre. Forming a large, open plan kitchen, dining and living area to the original croft house obviously meant that old kitchen was redundant; so, what would it become?
One rule to any addition to this house was that the more convenient would trump the more rational - a product of what was easiest and probably cheapest to do. The house has three entrances and not a one of them face the approach from the access track - fine for locals familiar with the property but it always bothered me that you arrive at the house and there is no celebrated entrance to welcome you in - all entrances are tucked away to the sides (not even intuitively), and once entered, there is a circuitous hallway leading you either into a kitchen or a living room… it was just weird growing up there but again, it was the nature of the place and developed it’s own quirkiness.
So it made sense to form a new entrance to the side of the house you naturally approach from the access track - this would also line through with the hall to the new end of the house as well as give direct access into the open plan space. It would allow a ‘decontamination/decompression’ chamber where you could throw off boots and coats - a natural progression into a space… if there had been more space available, or if I had not opted for the bedroom, a ‘warming room’ would’ve been on my wish list for sure and would’ve worked in utilising the old chimney that had since been blocked up. For now though, it made sense to form a small utility off this new entrance as well as another bedroom to this side of the house. I wanted this bedroom to be more of a master bedroom and so I decided an en-suite would be a nice touch. It was clear that fitting both in would be a challenge and a lack of wardrobe space was definitely lamented by those I showed the plans to: ‘Where would you hang a dress'?’… but luckily for me, I don’t wear many. I also wanted the room to be close to the front door for any ambulant users (turning a window into a door) and the en-suite made the room more autonomous for this purpose.
The strip out was the most satisfying part of the front rooms (save, perhaps, the fittings and finishes) however I didn’t have to contend with stripping out the floor joists or breaking an area of concrete. Furthermore, the ground level was too high to allow for ventilation to the solum - you need a minimum of 150mm clear space but I wanted 300mm to avoid any potential ventilation issues and allow for a small person to fit down there in the event of any unforeseen problems, This resulted in a lot of digging, handballing detritus out the window and into a new landmass on the patio opposite - a problem for ‘future me’ to blame ‘past me’ for. Regardless, progress pushed on and save from the obvious time saver of forming the new door to the existing window and allow materials to be taken in as well as out, the work steadily resulted in a new suspended timber floor.
Of course, services had to be run for drainage and water supply to the en-suite, as well as tidying up the mess of pipes leading to and from the external oil boiler to the corner of the old kitchen, repairing a portion of the original timber kit structure and coring a number of holes for underfloor ventilation, as well as mechanical ventilation to the proposed shower enclosure.
Thankfully I had a modicum of help from my half brother and cousin on this one.
Once I had cleared the ground, I formed a strip foundation to take a small concrete block wall to support the joists mid-point. I could’ve spanned the entire length with deeper joists but I wanted to use a timber dimension that tied in with the existing, as one end of the joist sat upon the wall plate to the existing timber kit. This also meant I could use the same dimension timbers for the timber kit as for the floor joists, with both being C24 as opposed to C16 grade. It also kept the depth of the floor to a minimum, giving more ventilation space to the solum/less ground to dig out. I checked the spans on the ‘Small Structures’ guide from the Building Standards Division and they were more than adequate for the span.
Latterly, I decided to address the new entrance door by fitting a new concrete lintel, shoring up the pier to one side and cutting out the lower portion of wall. This also made it so much easier getting sheet materials into the house. I poured a new strip foundation to the base of the proposed door - there was none there previously, just stone upon the compressed earth, and tried to tie it into the adjacent stone, to form a base for a small portion of masonry block to support the weight of the new door. This portion seemed to take a lot of time as chopping through 400mm of stone and concrete with small power tools isn’t ideal. One job I worked in Broadford made use of a stone chainsaw that apparently cut through 650mm of stone like butter… well, I already had my fill with the Hilti corer so it was time to make do with what I, i.e., my cousin, had in the tool shed.
Some jobs distract me before I’ve finished what I set out to do and I was eager to add some timber straps to the wall to form the 50mm clear ventilated void between the existing concrete walls and what would become the new lining - more or less the same as the front rooms. In my defence, I needed to do this to understand where to set out the edge of the floor: the walls were, no surprise, nothing like level, so I needed to find a datum to set out from - this would be the minimum of 50mm and whatever was left was left - the new walls would be parallel and plumb! The plan was to core holes for ventilation and fit periscope vents - this is because the external ground level was more or less the same as internally, meaning any vents would be below ground level. Periscope vents allow a hole to be made higher up the wall externally, to drop down within a void internally and provide fresh air to the solum - this is also where the 50mm void in the wall helped to take the duct channel. Once the solum was being ventilated, the 50mm void to the walls would also get ventilated, culminating in cross ventilation to a ceiling void, provided by slate vents either side of the pitch, creating a pressure differential when the inevitable wind blows. Of course I would ensure a continuous layer of insulation, taped and sealed to avoid warm air escaping into this cool, ventilation zone but the greatest will in the world won’t be 100% effective - not to mention any services that needed to penetrate this insulation seal, such as electrical cables, water and heating pipes.
Richard the roofer (of some YouTube fame, I hear) makes an appearance to fit Velux roof lights (a task I would not touch myself) allowing midday light into the rooms with no South facing windows - a huge difference.
DIY work on this scale allows you to get involved in every aspect of construction: building; joinery; plumbing; electrics and finishing/decoration.Each one of these intills a different feeling for me. I enjoy the rough and satisfying work of building, stripping out, opening up, rebuilding and shaping the core of things to come; joinery work makes sense to me, shaping wood, working to greater precision and planning for things to come; plumbing isn’t my favourite but I understand it and respect it; same too for electrics, though I do enjoy this more; finishing/decoration takes patience and preparation, two qualities I don’t always possess - and if the previous trades haven’t aligned, this can be a frustrating stage… no one wants to strip out their work.
All of this makes you appreciate the skill and experience of a good contractor - the ability to understand the pitfalls and planning required to align all these elements. It also demonstrates the worth of a good architect, who can understand aesthetic and coordination issues at the desgin stage; with a clear plan, the journey can be mapped out with certainty. Of course, sometimes pitstops or detours are necessary but for the most part, a well thought out plan can accomodate these. But a good package of information is no use if it is not well understood, and that’s where a good contractor comes in, to read through and understand the drawings so they can be communicated to the various trades. All of this costs significantly more money than a typical build and explains why you don’t see a high attention to detail in most homes.
Getting a new platform underfoot is both satisfying and intimidating; you finish a significant chapter but you also cover up some important elements: plumbing; insulation; drainage… this is where hatches allow for inspection to ensure these elements operate as required, or to allow for future maintenance - and I still haven’t yet formed one… another dance with potential danger but all seems fine so far. I think the most satisfying part here is feeling I have finally dealt with the core problems the space suffered from: no clear air space beneath the floor, damp issues, no insulation to the floor, no insulation to the water pipes, crazy/redundant pipework etc., and of course, moving on to forming the new bedroom, en-suite and utility entrance.
With the insulation going on the walls and ceiling, the space begins to feel new, clean… and a little space-age. The open-ness of the space is always appealing and forming the layout for the 3 rooms was tentative - a few more centimetres one way, the least amount of space required for the en-suite, forming a reasonable utility area for a sink and washer/dryer… I began to realise the relationship between drawing a CAD plan on the computer and seeing how it translated to the space in reality. The CAD plan was THE plan and it allowed for some quick tests of various arrangements until one made the most sense balancing the various confliciting requirements… but once I was marking it out on site, there was an additional level of thought and some minor adjustments. It goes to show that in refurbishment work, you can’t necessarily design out everything - there will always be site-specific qualities you can’t anticipate, unless everything is stripped out prior to design and even then, the act of intervention that actual construction brings can generate new ways of considering design… and I think that is important too, the ability to adapt as you go. Afterall, we’re temporal beings and meaning can be a dynamic quality - what works today may be something else tomorrow.
I loved working on the en-suite, coordinating all differing elements; water supply to the shower, wall hung sink, toilet cistern and utility sink; the associated drainage to each appliance, the plumbing to the towel rail; the electrics to the undertile heating mat… but I’m not sure I want to do it all again soon. It was a whole project in itself and the finishing was a bit stressful at times. I’m ok with learning on the job - I find that type of experience to be more pronounced than watching someone else do it, or watching YouTube (of course, you need to be selective over what you really should know before starting a job) but some ‘mistakes’ become set in stone - example: the shower enclosure and floor tiles were a printed porcelain travertine but for the life of me, I couldn’t see a repeating pattern (or so I thought), but when it came to appraising the finished job, it was only Sods Law that two adjacent tiles had the same repeating pattern… I may chip it out in the future and replace it but for now, it’s a reminder of my (potentially shoddy) work ethic. This outlines the lengths you can go to in controlling these elements: laying out tiles/timber to select the positioning of each; going to the merchants yard to personally select your timber/sheet materials or even to ensure they are what you’re expecting.