Julian Owen - Self-build: How to design and build your own home

My thanks to all of the practices and architects featured in this book, as well as Ginny Mills and Clare Holloway at RIBA Publishing, the staff of Julian Owen Associates and 1st Architects, and the Directors and members of ASBA Architects Network.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003231257-1

1.0 Gokay Deveci Architect and Model D Homes, private house, Aberdeenshire.1.1 Orme Architecture, private house, Wells, Somerset.

B uilding your own house could become a major personal achievement. It is an opportunity to personalise almost every aspect of your home environment in ways that will change your life. There are countless inspiring stories of self-builders to be found on TV and in magazines, usually showing the successful families standing proudly in front of their dream home. If you would very much like to take this path yourself and have no experience of a major building project it may seem daunting. This is a normal and entirely rational reaction but dont let it put you off. There is a wealth of advice, support and professional help out there to guide you through the process of designing and building your home and this book could be your starting point. It is arranged as a step-by-step guide covering all the key issues that you will have to understand to complete a project, with sound advice illustrated by a few of the stunning buildings created every day by people just like you.

Self-build has been around since humans left the caves and started assembling twigs and leaves to make a shelter. For millennia, most homes were built by their occupant, or on their behalf by local builders. In more recent times, housing provision in the UK has developed to the point that if we want to live in a new home we assume that someone else will have to provide it for us. We are left to pick from whatever they decide to make available, regardless of our individual needs and preferences. According to many surveys carried out in the last few years this systemdoes not work well. Given the choice, only a fifth of homeowners would buy a new house and half of us prefer an older building. In 2017 the UK government recognised there is a problem when it published a report, Fixing Our Broken Housing Market, which recognised that self-build should have a greater role in diversifying the market and reducing the housing shortage. Many newly built homes are not up to scratch and are very expensive whereas self-built homes generally have more individuality and are better designed and built. They are also more economical, saving up to a third of the cost of buying one from a developer.

1.2 A traditional Scottish croft.1.3 A recreation of a Stone Age hut at Escot Wildlife Park, Dorset.1.4 Henning Stummel Architects, Tin House, London.1.5 ADAM Architecture, private house, Bighton Grange, Hampshire. If you want to create a genuine Georgian-style house it is important to get the proportions and details right.

Given the many benefits of self-build you may wonder why it is not more popular. It makes up only between 5% and 10% of the houses built every year, roughly 10,000 to 15,000 in all (depending on whose figures you believe). The main barriers are obtaining a plot and persuading a bank or building society to provide funding. But the powers that be in national government have realised that a lack of support and encouragement is also part of the problem, as well as bureaucratic hurdles such as getting planning permission a process which is geared to favour applications for hundreds of houses rather than individual self-builders.

In stark contrast to the UK, in other countries such as Austria, Germany, Italy and Belgium self- and custom-builds make up around 50% of the market. Japan and the USA also have their own ways of self-building and it is considered a perfectly normal, mainstream activity. Almere, Holland has been held up as a role model by UK experts, where families are free to build as they wish, whether custom-build or self-build, as long as they follow a design code. Many of the issues that would otherwise make it difficult, such as services, irrigation and road connections, are already organised for them.

Now is a better time than ever to build your own home in the UK because there have been some significant developments in the past decade. The National Custom and Self Build Association (NaCSBA) was formed in 2008 to promote the concept and to lobby government to make it a genuine alternative on a par with any other option available to homebuyers. The result of the associationswork was a major achievement the Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Act (2015). This legislation was followed by other laws and government initiatives. Local authorities are now obliged to measure the demand in their area by keeping a Right to Build Register with the details of anyone who wishes to self-build. They must then adjust their policies so that planning approvals meet that demand within three years. The key legislation governing the way that planning applications are decided, the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), now makes at least a passing reference to encouraging self-build. In spite of this enthusiasm from Members of Parliament, there has been a mixed take-up by local authorities. Many have embraced the concept enthusiastically whilst a few show little enthusiasm, despite the legislation requiring them to publicise the list.

1.6 Orme Architecture, private house, Wells, Somerset.1.7 Stan Bolt Architect, private house, Highwood, Colaton Raleigh, Devon.1.8 Julian Owen Associates, private house, Nottingham.

Cherwell District Council seized upon these initiatives early, beginning a game-changing development at Graven Hill near Bicester in Oxfordshire. It comprises 188 hectares which will eventually sustain 1,900 self- and custom-built dwellings. Passports have been created for each plot that describe some design rules, the building materials preferred and details about the site such as services and ground conditions. If the guidelines in the passport are followed then planning approval is confirmed within four weeks, with a condition that the house is completed within a set timescale. Perhaps partly due to seeing the success at Graven Hill, many local authorities have developed their own proactive measures in areas as diverse as Stoke-on-Trent, Bristol, Carlisle, Gloucester, York and Glasgow.