Katherine Salant : The Custom House

Building a House that Makes Sense for You

With a custom-built house you get to put your personal stamp on everything—the floor plan, the style, and all those goodies that go inside. All that customizing, though, can cost a bundle. On average, custom home building costs about twice as much as production home building, plus you also have to buy the lot. With production building, the builder includes the lot cost in his price.

If cost is not an issue, the first step in realizing your dream house is fleshing out that plan you’ve had in your head for years. If you’re after something unique, say the feel of a resort that you love, you need an architect. If your interests lean more towards exquisite materials and less in an elaborate design and detailing, you might go directly to a plan service or a home builder.

Architects Weigh In: Big House Design Challenges

Four architects weigh in on the challenges of designing big houses — picking a style that looks right at a large scale, helping clients understand just how big a 5,000-square-foot house can be, designing communities of large houses on small lots, and helping clients take advantage of the design opportunities that a large house presents. For example, large collections can be organized, displayed and become a part of daily life.

Big Houses Can "Live Small"

When big houses “live small,” the owners don’t feel like they live in a museum. Design tricks to mask size include hexagon-shaped rooms (when a room has more than four corners, most people can’t tell how big it is), higher ceilings in the middle of rooms (this makes a large room feel smaller) and narrow passageways between rooms (so you can’t see more than one room at a time).

Local Artisans Deliver Custom Touches

Local artisans can add a custom touch to a new house for a surprisingly affordable price. The only hitch is that they are often small, one-person operations, and they can be hard to locate. In Ann Arbor, Mich., where I live, I found a brother and sister team who make tiles, a potter who can make sinks, and two muralists.

Latest Susanka Books Explain Lovable Living Spaces

Why do you love some houses and rooms and hate others? As Sarah Susanka explains in her “Inside the Not So Big House” and “Home by Design,” the answers can be complicated, but she offers explanations in straightforward English that is remarkably jargon free.



	© 2003-2008 Katherine Salant