Week 2: Tree Hugging

Here the view at the start of week 2. A mud mat has been installed at the driveway entrance. (Think a large doormat for vehicles, that keeps the trucks from making the road all muddy at the entrance). There are several trees within the construction area which we want to preserve during the construction process. These have additional silt fences to protect them from dirt during the construction process as well as an orange tree protection fence to keep them visible and safe.


The surveyors were out to fine tune the staking positions (which were originally placed by the architect). The wood posts are the old stakes, the orange flags are the new. The first set were for a general sense of where the house would sit on the site. Now they will be accurate enough to use for the actual construction process.



This is an approximation of one of the decks on the guest house. Our architect constructed it out of bamboo, somehow managing to drive from Asheville and up curvy mountain roads with 26 feet pieces of bamboo strapped to the top of the car. It's there to show the relationship between it and the smaller of the two retaining walls (the one that will be holding the end of our driveway in). The architectural review committee for Creston is concerned that it will be visible from the road below our site. We (as well as our architect, landscape architect, and others) have been attempting to convince them their concerns are unfounded. As we're attempting to demonstrate here, the one direction that you may be able to catch a glimpse of the wall from will be obscured by the house.


The same bamboo structure, with Melanie included for scale, so you can see just how tall it is.