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Private Notes
Kevin McCloud follows the progress of architectural designer Lincoln Miles and his wife, artist Lisa Traxler, who want to create their own home on the Isle of Wight. They have bought a property on a prime piece of land and set out to transform it into a creative structure that complements the unspoilt woodland setting.
Helen and Chris Seymour Smith are architects who are planning to build a subterranean, eco-friendly house underneath a ruined 300-year-old barn in the Cotswolds. Kevin McCloud follows their progress as they set out to create a building that is airtight and needs no heating, but whose spartan interior raises questions of habitability
Kevin McCloud follows the efforts of Lucie Fairweather to build an eco-friendly house in Woodbridge, Suffolk. After the death of her partner 18 months earlier, and not having a large budget, Lucie is determined to create a beautiful and affordable family home with the help of Jerry Tate, an architect who was involved in the design of the Eden Project
Kevin McCloud follows the progress of Simon Bennett and his wife Jill as they try to restore two timber-framed barns in Suffolk. The couple found out that one of the buildings is among the smallest surviving medieval guildhalls in the country, and while Kevin advises the pair to conserve it in its present state, Simon is determined to restore it to its former glory.
Jonathan and Lindsay want to build a house that's exciting to look at, cheap to run, and ecologically sound. But the build is a battle, with technologies that don't work and a tight budget.
Kevin meets interior designer Kathryn Tyler, who has decided the best way onto the property ladder is to design and build her own house in her parents' back garden in Falmouth.
Alan Dawson has invented his own way of making a house, with every piece put together on site in days. But it must all fit perfectly. Only then will Alan know if his unique house works.
When Robert and Milla Gaukroger find a plot overlooking Lake Windermere in the Lake District National Park, they reckon they've hit gold.
In 2006, Daren Howarth and Adi Nortje moved from Brighton to Brittany to take on a huge life experiment. Their plan was to build an earth-sheltered home almost entirely from recycled materials, and to live the most sustainable lifestyle as possible. Now that the work is finished, Kevin returns to see whether their big life experiment has been a success.
Master carpenter Bill Bradley and his wife Sarah built not one but two timber houses in south London on the site of Bill's old wood workshop. Their plan was to sell one to pay for the other in the hope of living mortgage-free, but the long narrow site, sandwiched between two rows of houses, was far from an easy proposition.
Six years ago Thomas and Dervla O'Hare set out to build a spectacular split-level home cascading down a practically vertical hillside in Belfast. No one in their right mind would have built on such a steep slope; but ambitious young architect Thomas believed he could do anything as long as he put his mind to it. He set up a fast track building programme to complete this enormous, contemporary home in record time.
In 2003, aspiring writer Mark Sampson, his wife Debbie and their daughter Tilly moved to the Lot region of France to build their dream home. Despite a total lack of experience, but driven by strong ecological principles, they decided to take the radical step of constructing it using straw-bales. Seven years after they moved in, Kevin McCloud goes back to see whether their new house has fulfilled its brief.
As one of `Grand Design's' first projects, Andrew Tate and Deborah Mills found a site with a monstrous, dilapidated, 100 foot tall water tower on it. Kevin went back to see Andrew and Deborah three years after they had moved into their contemporary extension, but they had still made no progress on the water tower, and were living with minimal bedroom space. Kevin returns again to see how they've fared.
When Pru and Richard Irvine came across a plot of land in the middle of the breathtakingly beautiful Midlothian countryside, they seized the opportunity to build on it a bespoke family home. However, the plot, an old industrial site complete with lime kilns, came with a condition. They could only build on it if they become custodians of the kilns, and more importantly, that the house they built blended in to its setting.
