framing

Framing has begun! Our first floor trusses, subfloor and shear walls are now in place. Above, you can see the shear walls - these metal units are required as we have large expanses of glass that cannot support the weight of the materials above. There's a massive header that rests on top of the shear walls and distributes the weight evenly (it was installed after our visit, so it's not in the picture). In the above shot, the near wall with three shear walls will face our backyard/pool - the three large openings along that wall will be floor to ceiling windows.



Above is a view toward the house from the backyard. You can see where the three sets of windows will be between the shear walls - each set of windows contains a sliding door that will open onto a stone patio. The ground will then be terraced down to the driveway on the right.


Above, framers installing the outer wall near our pantry.


Above, a view into our garage (near) and basement (far). There will be a wall, stairway and mechanicals between the two spaces. Our garage will get light through windows in the door, but the basement will unfortunately have no windows as the house is nestled into the hill. We'll have an air exchange unit down there to keep the air fresh. Can't have a bar/pool room with stale air.


Above, we've got squatters! There are a couple of bird's nests in the floor trusses. Apparently this is very common during construction, and our framers actually keep an eye out to make sure the eggs hatch undisturbed.


On our way out of town, this guy was in front of us. Gonna have to get me one of them.

We're hopefully going back up toward the end of this week - might even have a second floor by then! This part of the construction process is supposed to fly, so expect significant activity over the coming months.

See ya.