Friday 26 June 2015

Hand drawn Hackney!


A couple of days back i have had the pleasure to receive the full set of visuals From Warren. 
and WHAT VISUALS! 

I am simply going to let his work speak for itself. 

Courtyard 1 

Courtyard 2

Courtyard 2 view from bedroom 4

Plans 

Double height -dining / sitting room view 1

Sitting room view 2

Sitting room - view 3

Master bedroom

Areal view 

Thursday 25 June 2015

Drama on the Riviera!

Not all smooth sailing on the Italian Riviera...

Another title for this post could have been "An ongoing saga on the Riviera"

After weeks of: research, visits, international property solicitors "advice" (and bills), italian speaking "geometras" (planning technicians), research on average temperatures (and other weather related matters).... The list could go on...

In short all boxes ticked: 40mn to international airport, seaside, stunning view, a project (of course has to be!) , affordable ( for a faraway dream that may turn out to be only used for a week a year.. After years of planning and foreign language builders!) 

Bottom line is after gathering all my strength and finally putting an offer for that humble little shed and adjacent piece of land (with that absolutely gorgeous view!)

I have to add here that there is quite a leap of faith from my side on this project.... Italian building laws are not only obscure and strangely flexible, but also scarily slippery!

.... But the views!!!!!!

Anyway. The deal was one offer for the building and a tiny bit of land, and another offer for additional land from another party to gain the right to enlarge the footprint of the existing shed.... (Not going into planning details here)

Agent puts the last bit of pressure and says another Italian buyer from Turin is interested has put an offer, but if you put a little more... (Pls note the use of the oldest trick in the book!)

So here we go offer gets signed and faxed. And accepted!

Butterflies of excitement... Dreams of sunny and lazy days (next to "The mother of all cactuses" *see picture below) flood the hypothalamus with happiness hormones...

BUT, BUT, BUT... 2 days later; The seller of the additional land turns around and says:

"I own half the hill... And actually I don't accept the offer for the bit i originally wanted to sell because instead a the little bit that you need, I want to sell the whole hill for an additional 4x what you wanted to spend!"

(Am paraphrasing a little but you get the picture!)

After all these days of daydreaming... Back to reality (of the dodgy world of Italian real estate!)

Apologies ... That turned out to be a long post! 


Now a few pictures (that speak more then a thousand words)  on which the daydreaming was based!

The " mother of all cactuses "
The shed!



The saga ... To be continued. 

Wednesday 10 June 2015

Beauties in faraway lands....it must be an addiction.

This post is admittedly a little off topic.

Its not about the hackney project; but still essentially about special spaces.

What would a true addict do during a well deserved break?

You guessed it: look for derelict spaces with potential!

Let me just show you a couple of pictures.

Dreams of faraway lands with an edited selection of beauties...

Very special in Brindisi.... 
Surrounded by old olive trees and a distant sea view. 
& serious dimensions. 
 

Otherwise, something more modest in Bordigehera? 
with a cactus!
 palm trees... And a south view to die for!




Or back to Puglia: Bari with this cute little "Trulli" 
Stunning stonework. 
The pool is not there... But if i close my eyes... 

Or a fish processing garage in Monopoli?

With a backyard 
Overlooking a perfectly swimable little port? 

There was also the troglodyte ("carved out of the rock) olive oil mill, the Masseria..... And and and...