Project Name and Location
Federbush Residence, Cornville, Arizona
Designed By
Jason Federbush Architect
About the House Design
E-crete house built to work with contours of sloped site with minimal disturbance to natural desert vegetation. The entry area has a second floor bridging over a dry wash. E-crete lends itself to square boxy houses with small windows, and I tried to push the envelope with what can be done with this material. I was interested in the process used to create several hand-built houses in this area, but wanted a clean modern aesthetic. House was built mainly by 3 men with minimal use of subcontractors.
Important Features
I feel that the modern aesthetic was successful even with the house being hand-built on tight budget. House created minimal disturbance to the site. E-crete seemed like ideal high desert material due to thermal massing, and I used passive solar design. House has radiant floor heat along with supplemental solar hot water. Entry has Japanese gen-kan step up, where shoes are removed.
Advice
- I used Autocad LT which is much less expensive than the full version of Autocad. I also use Sketchup for 3d drawing, which is free.
- E-crete does not take much skill to install, but is more time consuming than I thought.
- I also learned about how risky construction loans are since the house needs to appraise for more than the loan amount when complete, or the bank can take it even when you make all payments. I spent a lot of time on the cost estimating and this was very important to do accurately.
