Customizing the Caroline II
One of the nice things about building a custom log home is that you can change anything you like. It’s like being fitted for a house. These are some of the things that I had changed from the original model.
This is in no particular order. I'm just rattling off now and I'll organize it better for you later.
Unlike Southland's Caroline I model, the Caroline II has a staircase that begins partially inside the great room. This makes the great room on the Caroline II smaller while improving the size of the upper floor space. Realizing this, I had my builder stretch the great room to extend it an additional 5 feet to make up the difference.
The model home I walked through had really good sized rooms and good use of the floor space however I did notice that the closet space for the upper floor bed rooms were a bit shallow. I requested my upper floor bedroom closets to be just a little deeper.
Both wings of the house (left & right) have been stretched from 14 feet to 16 feet. My-oh-my what a couple more feet can do for a room. This makes all bedrooms, the dinning room, and the kitchen all 2 feet bigger.
I put a full walkout basement under my house. Consider the cost vs. the floor space and you just won't be sorry. I did however ensure that the house was place on the property so that the side of the house that was up-hill would allow for no more that 3 or 4 steps to get up onto the porch to enter the house.
This house includes a full, covered wraparound porch that goes completely around the house. The width is 8 feet for most of it to allow for a comfortable (functional) lounging area. (Yep, got the hammock spot all picked out already).
Redesigned the master bedroom's bathroom and walk-in closet. So much so that I can't begin to note the changes... see the pictures for details.
I moved the staircase from the right side of the great room to the left. This was to open up the walkthrough between the great room and the kitchen/dinning areas. The wall the the staircase moved over to was blank anyway so no loss of functional floor space. The side affect of this was that floors space for the entire upstairs of the house had to be reversed to make the half-balcony work.
Because I plan to put a full unfinished basement under the house I'm asking for an upgrade to the electrical panel from a 200 amp service to 400 amp service so that I will be able to add more circuits for the basement when its done.
Also having a false floor put in the basement area that is just under the great room. I never liked the feel of a cement floor even if you tile it. You always know that your in the basement. I would like to fix up the basement so that it's part of the house and not just a second class area. The false floor will be 2x4's framing, insulation, and 3/4 inch plywood. I can do the rest of the basement floor myself later but I wanted to ensure that the walkout doorway and the bottom of the stairs were designed for the raised floor from the beginning.
Adding dormers to the rear of the house. Big ones; 8 feet wide. The rear of the house has the killer view and I wanted the upstairs bedrooms to get a big window view of it. I ordered 6 foot wide x 3 foot tall, half-round custom windows for these dormers so that a standard headboard of a bed could be set just under the window (if you like).
The logs on this house are also custom. They are Western Red Cedar in a dovetail cut. very nice looking wood. I have some links on the "Da Plan" page that have some details of this beautiful wood. The short of it is that this wood doesn't check very much; or shrink much; and it has a very good insulation 'R' factor because its quite dense. Resists most bugs and rot too.
The basement walls on this house are 9 feet tall. That one more foot than the norm. I noticed that the air duct work on other houses always seem to take up some much room that you end up with 7 foot walls in finished basements. So... I'm added space for the ducts and plumbing now.