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Sun Tea Recipe
Watermelon Rum Mush Recipe |
| Reassessing 'Small' | |
Small doesn't have to mean tiny, it's just a way of reassessing what you really need for space to be comfortable and functional. Smaller is sustainable, human-scaled, easier to clean and maintain. This edition of Design Matters reflects on "small" - we really believe that many homes today are over-built, creating spaces you don't need, can't use, and don't want to maintain. Small is comfortable. Small is functional. Small can meet your needs, and your lifestyle. Small is affordable. Small is beautiful!
Sarah Susanka, Architect, encouraged most of us towards a whole new way of thinking about the way we live and the way we build our houses. While she is certainly not the only architect who's thought and designed along those lines, she has brought the conversation into the mainstream. If you've not read her work, we encourage you to view her website:
Click Here.
We have her books on our shelves here at cf+a and if you'd like to take a look, feel free to stop in. We have a pretty extensive architectural library and it's open to you! | |
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KEEP COOL WITHOUT A/C!
Close Curtains and Windows!
Regardless of the style of window treatments you use, if they block the sun at all, be sure to close them tight during the day, especially if you're gone all day at work. Keeping the hot sun at bay during the peak of the day will keep its heat out of your home.
Be sure also to keep your windows closed as this will keep the hot air from coming in. This combination will make a significant difference. Keeping your windows closed will also reduce the humidity inside your home which will add greatly to your overall comfort level. When the sun starts to set and the outside air temperature starts to cool, open the curtains and the windows and allow the whole house to cool off overnight.
And don't forget to use bamboo or other tightly-woven blinds on the outside of your home at porches, French doors, and large windows to shade the interior, especially those facing the south and west sides of your home.
This is one of the easiest, and the greenest, methods of keeping your house cooler.
Create Breezeways!
There's a really good reason why good designers place windows and doors on all sides of a home. If you pay some attention to which way the wind is blowing, you can capitalize on the "free" air movement caused by cross-ventilation. Open windows and doors that allow the breeze to pass straight through your house. During the day your house might not feel cooler per se, but the breeze created will prevent that stuffy feeling your house gets when the windows are closed. At night, the cooler breezes will significantly reduce the inside temperature.
Create breezeways by using window fans. Place a fan in a window or door on opposite sides of the house - face one out to draw out the hot air, face the other one in to bring in the cooler air from outside - particularly helpful when it comes to sleeping, again to get that air moving and to provide cooler temperatures to circulate throughout your home.
Use the Equipment You Already Have!
If your central heating system has a "Fan On" or "Fan Only" setting on the thermostat (some call it by a different name, but most systems have this setting), use it to get air circulating throughout the houses. This is really helpful if you have no ceiling fans to circulate air. Yes, it's going to use electricity, but it's still a lot "greener" than using the air conditioning, if you have it.
Cool Down Outside Heat Sinks!
Concrete and asphalt heats up during the day and can hold that heat for hours into the night which can then add heat to your home. The best way to cool off a "heat sink" is to spray it down! Use your garden hose to spray the driveway and sidewalks as well as the exterior foundation walls around your home to eliminate the stored heat. The water hitting the concrete or asphalt causes evaporation which sucks the heat right out of the surface and cools everything down. Pretty nifty, eh?
Don't Make It Worse!
The modern home provides lots of opportunities to add heat to our homes. Things like appliances, electronic devices and lighting are all common sources of internal heat. Take some time to think about these sources in your home and then be wise about their usage. Delay heat-generating activities like running the dishwasher until evening on very hot days. Come up with cool alternatives to heating up your kitchen (and hence the rest of your house) by grilling outdoors or using a microwave.
When you cook, be sure to use the range hood or kitchen exhaust fan to take the overheated air out of your kitchen. Cooking and baking can be done late in the evening, if necessary, in preparation for the next day's meals to take advantage of the cooler temperatures at night and the gift of time as you sleep to allow the heated air to dissipate.
Same goes for lights - all incandescent bulbs produce heat so don't use them until you have to. And make the switch to CFL's for both energy savings and cooler temperatures while in use.
Hydrate and Help Yourself to Cool Drinks and Cool Food!
We hear all the time the advice to drink lots of water - it's really important to stay hydrated during hot spells, so keep that filtered water close to you and sip it all day long to allow your body to naturally cool itself. And enjoy fresh juices and iced drinks to add flavor and sparkle to your cooling regime. Go light on the alcohol content as alcohol tends to dehydrate, the opposite of what you want!
Just before bed, treat yourself to a cool shower - it'll quickly bring down your body temperature allowing you to drift off to sleep a little easier.
Summer's the best time to change your eating habits too - so think cool foods - green salads, cold soups for lunch or dinner, and try fresh fruit and yogurt or cool fruit smoothies for breakfast. Eating lighter also keeps your body cooler as it doesn't have to work so hard to digest what you've put into it.
Just for fun, we included a couple of summertime recipes in this issue to cool you down and fill you up!
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| SUN TEA |  | |
As the mercury breaks 100°F on these hot summer days (or 38°C for those of you on a metric system) a great way to make some tea without heating up your kitchen is to use the power of the sun to make sun tea.
Ingredients: 4-6 Bags of Tea
Method: Put 4 to 6 tea bags into a clean 2 quart glass container. Fill with water and cap. Place outside where the sunlight can strike the container for about 3 to 5 hours. Move the container if necessary to keep it in the sun. When the tea has reached its desired strength, remove from sun and put it in the refrigerator. You may or may not want to remove the tea bags at this point.
The tea will probably taste more mellow than what you are used to from using boiling water. The slow seeping has a way of bringing out a slightly different flavor from the tea. Also, because you didn't use boiling water, you should refrigerate the tea and drink it up pretty quickly - a day or two. It will not keep as well as iced tea made from boiling water.
Sun tea can be made with various forms of tea, some prefer herbal tea. Sometimes you can put in a few sprigs of fresh mint as well to spruce up the flavor.
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In this edition of Design Matters, the critique is from a new website we've found with house plans that are small, some even diminutive, but beautiful - and cost conscious and environmentally sensitive at the same time. Check out the website of this Whidbey Island architect:
Click Here
Let us know what you think. And remember, anytime you have a question or comment about anything you read in this newsletter, you can email us at designmatters.cfa@gmail.com. Or find us anytime for your architectural questions and projects at info@fyearch.com 815-233-2215 |
Featured Article
 Design Matters August, 2010
Ross Chopin's
"Erin" with optional garage
The time of the small house has come! We're quite enamored with small homes, actually, and have long decried the "McMansion" style of home building - very popular, we know, but honestly, a lot of houses have been built that were never really designed with family living in mind. Small homes must carefully consider your lifestyle, and yes, sometimes small sacrifices are made. In the end, though, we believe your choice of a small house will reward you with years of lower maintenance, lower energy costs, comfort, and joy!
This month's house comes from a new site we've found. An architect based on Whidby Island, Washington has designed a number of small houses and you can view them on his website (see link). We selected the "Erin" with the optional garage plan.
Starting with the exterior of the streetside elevation, we think the large bay window in the living room is out of scale to the rest of the house, and, as it turns out, causes some unusual framing in the second floor (see our comments below). We would lose the top row of the window and bring it back down to the same level as the other window and the front door. While we're at it, we'd change the porch roof from it's current gable style to a "shed" roof style and stretch it across the front of the house. Two reasons: first, it grows the porch and makes it more usable, and second, it gives a sense of openness to the front of the house. That tiny porch feels crammed into a corner and not so welcoming.
We really like the floor plan of this home, beginning with the grand straight line directly from the front door to the back door. The tucked away living room is lovely and quiet for reading or television viewing. The open dining room and kitchen is perfect for family living or for entertaining small groups. The kitchen layout is about perfect and while small, feels and acts larger with its open plan.
We like the master suite at the back, but we would shrink the size of the laundry, moving the bathroom to make room for a closet in the bedroom. We also think that the bay window is lovely looking out to the back garden, but many of us prefer headboards on our beds which might be problematic here. There is room on the wall adjacent to the terrace for your bed which opens the window up for a seating area. We'd probably add a door to the bedroom for privacy, especially since this master bedroom will likely also serve as the guest bathroom (one of those small house sacrifices)
The stairway at the back, leading both upstairs and to the basement is really lovely and light-filled; if you choose to use the basement as a garage though, be mindful of the noxious fumes and toxins that come along with it. A basement garage has its positives which is one of the reasons we chose the basement option with this house plan, but there are special considerations. Add a door at the bottom of the stairs to aide in separation, and, think carefully about an exhaust system, a wall between the cars and the rest of the basement, drywall and paint in the garage portion, and additional insulation and sealants.
Upstairs, the two bedrooms are of a good size but keep in mind that the headroom is challenged by the gable roof. Bedroom 2 shows the bed on the tall wall; they show two options at this bedroom - you can open it up as a more public loft space, or close it off as shown, depending on your needs. Bedroom 1 shows the bed tucked under the eaves which can be a problem for adults or taller children. The interesting thing we noticed is, in raising the height of the living room ceiling to accommodate the over-sized window, they created a bump up into this bedroom, affectionately known in this office as a "tripper". Here's how we would solve that: We've already taken out the tall window downstairs, so no bump-up is required. So, why not build a screen wall where the bump-up was to put the bed against, opening the space, and creating a "hallway" of sorts between the bedroom and the closet (you could even put hanging pegs on the back of the wall for those items you go to frequently). And, since you're building in a basement, you can move that water heater down and relocate the closet door to that spot.
Last change we'd make is to re-size and relocate the skylights in the roof for aesthetics and for better light distribution throughout those rooms.
Overall, really a lovely little home. We like the floor plan and the exterior look.
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HOT HOT HOT!
OK, enough already. I give up. I'm reduced to a puddle in this heat and humidity, happiest when I'm in the office enjoying the cool, conditioned air.
Most of the time, I'm perfectly content not having air conditioning in my home - I find it artificial and almost too cold for my liking. Give me open windows and cross-ventilation anytime! But weather like this even has me begging to install the latest and greatest high-efficiency HVAC system! There have been such great strides made in recent years in energy efficient residential heating and cooling systems, so if you're thinking about upgrading your system, or installing a new one in your existing home, here's one website you can go to for good information: http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=heat_cool.pr_hvac On this site, be sure to click on the products tab which will give you information on the wide range of products that have earned energy efficiency ratings.
Keep in mind that this year there are also tax incentives and reimbursement programs from the federal government to take a bit of the sting out of these big-ticket household improvements. Go here to find information: http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=tax_credits.tx_index, and here: http://www.energysavers.gov/financial/70010.html Google your home state's Department of Commerce as well to learn of any state-level incentives being offered.
For most of us, high heat and humidity are merely an inconvenience - we know it can't last forever and we do what we can to cool ourselves down. So, in the spirit of outlasting this terrible hot stretch, we've brought you a bunch of ideas for keeping cool even without air conditioning. See the list in the sidebar and the cool recipes too!
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FUN SUMMER RECIPES
 Pat's Poached Salmon:
The night before you want to serve the salmon, place approximately 3 lbs. of large filets or a whole salmon in a large pan and cover with water (you can also use white wine or a combination of wine and water). Add 1 Tbs. salt. Bring water to a boil. Immediately remove from heat and allow to sit for 10 minutes. Drain the salmon, then place in the refrigerator to cool.
To serve, remove the skin and arrange salmon on a bed of fresh garden lettuces, arugula, spinach, etc. Sprinkle all with sea salt & fresh-ground pepper, drizzle with a little lemon and/or olive oil if you like, and grace with sprigs of fresh herbs of your choice (dill would be great, or perhaps marjoram and oregano). Serve chilled or at room temperature with condiments to suit your taste, including dill & sour cream, pesto, chutneys, relishes and curries.
Serve a good crusty bread with this salmon dish, and a crisp, cool white wine and you'll satisfy most appetites!
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Watermelon Rum Mush  Drink up and get a healthy dose of cancer-fighting lycopene!
Ingredients:
6 fresh shiso (or mint) leaves, plus 8 additional sprigs for garnish
12 3/4 cups (2 3/4 quarts) cubed seedless watermelon, pureed and strained (makes
1 1/2 quarts juice)
1 2/3 cups white rum (or to taste)
Preparation:
Crush shiso in the bottom of a large pitcher, using a long wooden spoon. Add watermelon juice and rum; stir. Serve over ice; garnish with shiso sprigs.
Yield: Makes up to 8 servings.
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Last Call
As a reminder, cf+a can be found on multiple sites, including Facebook (christopher fye + associates architects + planners), Twitter:
fyearchitects and LinkedIn: Pat Leitzen Fye or Christopher Fye, and our new blog: http://cfadesignmatters.blogspot.com
Please contact us anytime for any of your architectural needs.
Christopher Fye + Associates |
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