gravel with the plastic honeycomb does give paving that will drain well, it is also a lot less work to install then block paving.

I have to up this thread due to something I saw recently. Step forward Bellway Homes. One energy related, one aesthetic.

Energy related - they appear to build chimneys by default.

But I thought the most ridiculous thing was aesthetic - they actually built a bricked up window, I assume to make it look like some window-tax effected property. On a four month old house!

I suppose you could argue, given it was N facing, that was better for energy saving!

In Georgian times they built fake windows to make a facade look regular even if it was not possible to put a window in where one was needed to make the building symmetric a so maybe that was what was going on.

Posted By: gravelldFour windows. Bottom two windows are there, TL window is there, TR is bricked. You can argue that to form the grid the window needs to be there I suppose.

Just seems lazy to me. It's not impossible to work out an asymmetric design. Bricking it up is ersatz.

Oh yes, it's only necessary for classical designs, which in any case I don't think are appropriate for most new builds.

Going back to meters, ours are in a purpose made built in cupboard that was built with the house. Originally both the electricity and gas came up through the concrete floor, but at some point the original gas pipe has been capped off and a new one put through the wall from outside. It seems a better solution than having the meters outside.

Ed

Chimneys and their associated leadwork keep the roofing trade in business. But with the advent of Freesat, they have become redundant even as TV antenna supports.

Posted By: tonyOften if not always they are not only thermal bridges and also act as thermal siphons drawing heated air out of the home.

goes without saying!

Hates, little gables at front - expensive to build, weak points for leaks - build it square with simple roofs. Anything that is 'fake'; Georgian, Tudor - the lot - IT'S THE 21ST CENTURY. Bloody planners - lets just build mud huts....

Posted By: gravelldIs it just the UK that has such conservative aesthetic tastes? I find it a bit cringeworthy.

I think the UK has very conservative aesthetic tastes, compared with other countries, and has for a long time. Think of all the mock-tudor houses of the 1930s when cutting-edge architecture involved geometric shapes in concrete etc.

Ed

My absolute pet peeve in this game is having to deal with the planning laws. For the reasons mentioned above by Fostertom. Though I generally do agree with the aspects of local planning that deal with infrastructure, the "aesthetics" guidelines are a joke generally. Some committee somewhere has decided what the "correct" vernacular is, and that we must never stray outside of it, for who are we to know differently. Until of course the next committee decides to change what the "real" proper vernacular should be....


Regions like Brittany are the worst for this, where they have decided that EVERY SINGLE BUILDING MUST BE WHITE (with a black roof). I like Brittany but have to turn that part of my brain off whenever I am visiting. Certainly couldn't work there under such architecturally fascist restrictions :)

And just to put this into a context outside of a rant, I certainly believe that these anaemic planning laws have a negative impact on implementing low energy building design.

Regarding putting chimneys in new houses, a new development near me, built in a mock 30's arts and crafts style, i.e. mock tudor, had fibre glass fake chimneys!

They arrived on pallets with pre installed lead flashing and were nailed onto the roof battens by the roofers, then tiled around.

To be fair, although i don't like "fake" stuff on buildings, these were a good idea.

-quick to go up, took about half an hour.
-no air leaks
-looks like the real thing from ground level

The only issue i could think of was the fibre glass "bricks" pattern would age differently from tne real bricks of the house (at the mo they match). But in 25 years time if they look crappy, it'll be a doddle to remove and tile over.

If a planner insisted on a chimney to look right, i'd use these!

I guess PVC is used when needed, cheaper than GRP.