So within these parameters and in conjunction with Gary we designed his home. He worked out the basic floor plan and room layout and our job was to work out the technical details of how the frame would work. After the design and price was agreed Gary contracted us to deliver the timber frame and finished shell, allowing him to do all the internal works and organise the other trades himself. A part of the design brief was, as much as possible to use timber from his wood, which was a classic little Devon Oak coppice with a Hazel under-storey and a carpet of bluebells. This meant there was a lot of interesting curves but not a lot of fat straight standards. So after a wander round we decided that the main frame would be Larch bought in and the braces and some feature pieces for the main living room would be Oak from the copse. So just before the bluebell popped up in the spring of 2013 we went in and selectively thinned enough of the Oak coppice to provide two Jowl posts, some natural double stemmed posts and about thirty braces. This was then taken back to our yard where we sawed out the pieces on our mill ready for framing in June.
In order to keep the budget down it was agreed that Gary would buy the Larch in the round, and pay for sawing directly. This was also done at our yard by Rupert Ferneaux of Landlogic Timber Ltd which would allow the timber to come straight off the mill and into the workshop to be framed up. Over the next month we slowly made up the frames, whilst Gary sorted out the ground works. Then at the beginning of July the frames were put up, and the two sections were put together. Then the windows, the doors and the south elevation glazing were fitted, the cladding and roof put on and our job was finished ready for Gary to take over the internal fit.