We at Arco Designs say YES.

After designing award winning eco homes for many years including 35 homes in The Currumbin Ecovillage we have started to attract people wanting larger homes and people wanting a bit more Luxury or something that doesn’t “look” eco but has all benefits of a sustainably designed house.

At first I wrestled with the concept of designing luxury homes thinking that they are wasteful.  But let’s face it, some people need larger homes and some people have worked hard and want a few of the comforts a luxury home can provide.

If people are going to build luxury homes – if they come to us at least they will be sustainable !

And if you look into the science of it – if the large home is designed badly (like most of them are), they are going to use 5 – 10 times the electricity that a well designed luxury home will.  Most of our clients have a zero electricity bill or even get money back.  This means we will save the planet about 5 homes worth of electricity per year.

So really our talents are possibly better spent designing large luxury homes that use less resources, than spending our time doing small sustainable homes and preaching to the converted.

So how do you make a large home sustainable I hear you ask ?

Firstly you need to rationalise the size of the home – we ask our clients, do they really need that media room ?  Or could that room be a multi purpose room ?  Does every bedroom need to be huge ?  Do they really need to be ensuited ? Perhaps they could have a share bathroom between 2 bedrooms.

If the answer is yes they do need those large rooms, then the best option is to make sure those rooms are well designed.

1/. Make sure they have good crossflow ventilation ie make sure that there are good openable windows / doors on at least 2 walls.

2/. Make sure they are functional ie they don’t have traffic corridors splitting the room in half and designed so that they can be furnished adequately.

3/. Make sure the windows are orientated correctly. Best orientation for most rooms is towards north.  You can’t get all rooms to face that way usually but some rooms can face other directions without much harm if done well.

4/. Make sure the windows are protected with cover that keeps the summer sun out while letting the winter sun in.  Shade screens and blinds can also help this.

5/. Make sure all rooms are well lit – naturally…

6/. Incorporate thermal mass where practical. ie a concrete slab or tiles preferably a dark colour to soak up the day time winter sun and releases it at night.  Or you could use a Rammed earth wall or off form concrete wall as a feature.  I have designed these into several of our homes, not just the luxury ones either.

7/. Use non – toxic materials throughout

8/. Make sure the main rooms for the house are fully accessible for people with limited mobility or for future mobility issues.

You never know who’s going to need a knee op or hip relacement…

The next obvious choice to making a large luxury home sustainable is the selection of materials.

We try to use long lasting materials in the right places, non toxic materials and low embodied energy materials.  Long lasting materials might be copper or zinc cladding. Most people don’t associate copper with being very sustainable, but it has a lot of great points: It’s wafer thin so it goes a long way for little material use.  It never, I repeat, never needs painting or maintenance.  It lasts forever. And if the owner wants to get rid of it (for some crazy reason ) it’s totally recyclable ! ?How many materials can you say that about ?

So when designing a luxury home on the gold coast, lets put a bit of extra thought into so you can reap the benefits of a naturally comfortable, great looking home design, one that you can be truly proud of and one the future generations will be too.

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Dr. Ralf Speth, Jaguar CEO, was the one who said the sentence above. Unfortunately, one of the most common mistakes that someone who’s thinking about building or renovating can make is price design as a measurable matter.

First of all, comparing ‘apples with apples’ can be quite a challenging task when talking about building design. Initially, because you have to make sure that all design professionals are quoting the same services, and this may include a number of hand sketches, 3D models, renderings, a number of sections and details, council approvals, consultants, site visits, client meetings, etc. Second, because the quality of a design may be related with the amount of time, money and dedication that each professional donates to keep up to date with courses, study and research. Third, experience counts, very much! Finally, nothing substitutes creative talent, and you have to make sure that you identify yourself with that designer’s style and taste.  Also a good designer will be able to design to your taste not just their own.

Thinking about the final cost of a house, for example, the design fees usually vary from 4 to 8% of construction cost. Too much?  No, and I’ll explain why.  If you were building an $800,000 house, the design would cost between 32K and 64K. This includes not only the (many) hours that the designer will dedicate to your project from meetings to time spent hand sketching or 3D modelling and detailing, but also all the time spent studying, researching, his/her experience (this is so valuable!), and creativity. These are ways of making sure that not only common mistakes that can cost a lot are avoided, but also that every dollar invested on that building will construct a space with quality, style, healthy, beautiful, functional, adequate to your needs, attending to the local regulations, and a UNIQUE HOME DESIGN.

If you were having to get surgery, would you look for an average doctor with an ordinary reputation, or would you look for someone in who you would trust completely, highly referred, even if this doctor would cost you a couple of extra thousand dollars? I’m sure no one wants to put their health at risk for that. So why do some people think that ‘saving’ 10% on the design costs is going to lead to a better result in the end?  Definitely not!  The old saying rings true “you get what you pay for”.  Building a house is often the biggest expense of your life, you can choose a mediocre designer or a really good designer.  It’s like building on bad footings, it’s all about preparation.

The costs of a bad design can go much further than living in a room that is too small, too large, or almost impossible to furnish. Changes happening during the building process are very expensive and stressful, and can cost far more if you have to make them after you have already moved in. Renovations can become a disaster if not well planned. Usually, these extra expenses triggered by a bad design are MUCH MORE expensive than the fees of that good building designer / architect you rejected due to price in the beginning of the process…

Furthermore, design plays a direct role on human health, both physically and psychologically. A space with the poor orientation and wrong openings can become too cold, too hot, too dark, have bad ventilation, etc. These issues are not only directly related to several health problems, but are also commonly the cause of extra costs with electricity in the long term through the excessive use of artificial lighting, air conditioning, artificial ventilation, and heating.

Under a psychological point of view, design can strongly influence human performance and behaviour. The position of a working bench in the kitchen or in the home office, for example, can trigger stress response from the most primitive part of our brain, the limbic system. Why? Because our survival instincts are very active and still work on a pretty primitive mode. This means that if your working bench is located in a way that your back will be facing the entry door, for example, you are more likely to not be able to relax, as your brain will keep you alert, in case something attacks you from behind.

A very low ceiling or a specific colour can cause a negative response for some and positive for others. Here is the importance of assessing each client individually, creating a personalised, quality and unique design for each one.

If you are not convinced yet, just think that a bad design costs a minimum of three times more than a good one. The first time is paying for building it. The second (and worst, in my opinion), is living in a space without quality – who wants to do that? Finally, if you can’t stand living in that space anymore, you have to pay again for renovating it. The consequences of a bad design are not related to just the building time, but they extend through all the use of that building, that means that you still paying the price for many, many years.

Most of all, it is important is to remember that all of our life is lived somewhere (preferably on the Gold Coast :). There’s no story without a scenario, every experience has a background, and every memory comes with a setting picture. We develop attachments to places and signify them, this is part of the human nature. Think about the importance of living in a healthy, beautiful, pleasant and special home that you love being in. Now, think again about the price of that good building designer… I’m sure you’ll see it with new eyes!

Tags: good design x bad design, designers fees, building designers fees, home design fees

The architecture of a country is deeply linked with its history and heritage. Brazil is a nation with more than 500 years of history, with a very rich culture and architecture, both defined by a big mix of the existing indigenous ethos and the several countries’ background that migrated to this beautiful country. Buildings become part of a nation’s history, they tell a story about their habits, uses, social organisation and evolution, revealing a lot about a country’s character.

The present contemporary Brazilian architecture is an advancement (or perhaps a celebration) of the modernist approach that had a very significant value to that country’s architectural history. The modernist style was adopted after World War Two, and was characterized by minimalism, absence of excess in decoration, and functional forms. In Brazil, some particular strains of this movement were the brutalism (use of raw materials), open plans, and the use of stilts.

Some of the main representative names of the Brazilian Modernist architecture are Oscar Niemeyer, Paulo Mendes da Rocha, Ruy Ohtake, Jaime Lerner and Lina Bo Bardi. We can see a few examples of this style bellow:MASP – Museum of Modernist Art, Sao Paulo, by Lina Bo BardiMASP – Museum of Modernist Art, Sao Paulo, by Lina Bo Bardi

MASP – Museum of Modernist Art, Sao Paulo, by Lina Bo Bardi

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Residence, Sao Paulo, by Ruy Ohtake

The current contemporary architecture style started between 1980 and 1990, and brings a lot of the modernist impressions within its concepts. It has in its impressions, the back of projective languages strongly committed to the reintegration of rationalism and minimalism, added to environmental and sustainability issues.

There is not a rigid style or striking feature to the contemporary Brazilian architecture as we could perceive in the modernist style. What happens now is a plurality, diversity and aggregation of elements and techniques, sharing influences from the Minimalism, the High Tech, the de-constructivism, and Modernism itself.

All this depth and complexity provided the Brazilian architecture with a very unique, distinct and recognizable character and style. The examples created from the modernist period until nowadays have a pretty distinct style, presenting a strong and elegant trace, mastering the wide open spans and the integration between inside and outside spaces.

Piracicaba House, by Isay Weinfeld

We can definitely see some similarities between their production, such as the big open plans merging the limits between interior and exterior, the lightness of the trace and the horizontal volumes. The extended use of exposed concrete is an evident heritage from modernism, as well as the use of stilts and the large cantilevered structures.

An interesting aspect that many of these professionals are valuing is the rescue of traditional authentic Brazilian techniques and materials. Some examples are the beautiful panels of tangled natural fibres extensively used by Jacobsen and Kogan, as well as the traditional local timber manufacturing methods used by Weinfeld and Jacobsen. These elements provide a distinctive and unreplaceable personality to these buildings, connecting them to their site, local culture and intrinsic history.

Even with interior design projects these local elements and features are broadly used, as we can see on the examples bellow:

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Residence in Paraty, by Marcio Kogan

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Toblerone House, Sao Paulo, by Marcio Kogan

Piracicaba House, by Isay Weinfeld

We can definitely see some similarities between their production, such as the big open plans merging the limits between interior and exterior, the lightness of the trace and the horizontal volumes. The extended use of exposed concrete is an evident heritage from modernism, as well as the use of stilts and the large cantilevered structures.

An interesting aspect that many of these professionals are valuing is the rescue of traditional authentic Brazilian techniques and materials. Some examples are the beautiful panels of tangled natural fibres extensively used by Jacobsen and Kogan, as well as the traditional local timber manufacturing methods used by Weinfeld and Jacobsen. These elements provide a distinctive and unreplaceable personality to these buildings, connecting them to their site, local culture and intrinsic history.

Even with interior design projects these local elements and features are broadly used, as we can see on the examples bellow:

House in Sao Sebastiao, By Marcio Kogan

In sum, the architecture produced nowadays in Brazil uses the past as a source, not denying, but celebrating. It also experiments and creates new trends and solutions. This multifaceted feature of architecture encompasses socioeconomic and sustainability criteria, showing the evolution of the way people are living and experiencing spaces.

Here at ARCO Designs on the Gold Coast we celebrate the multiculturalism and plurality of Australia having two Brazilian architects bringing some of this iconic inspiration to our projects. There are many similarities between our climates so it makes sense that we would incorporate many design features from Brazilian Architecture into our New Homes and renovation designs on the Gold Coast. Check out our website and see if you can recognise some of the elements we have discussed above in our projects!-