April 11-13 Trip

April 11th arrived cool and rainy in the south, but this did not deter us as we had assignments to tackle. After securing a hardy breakfast for Dave at the local"Waffle House" (destined to be our last visit to this chain) we headed to Daniel Island to check out the progress on our home. Dennis, our project manager met us at the site along with a pool builder to discuss ideas for size and placement. As the photo indicates we are still a long way from moving in, however it was exciting to see the start of the foundation and position of the house on the lot.

Our next appointment was at the appliance distributor, where we discussed our selections. We had a pretty good idea of what we were interested in and Dave came prepared with a list of the model numbers which made it very straight forward. The sales associate took the information and committed to get an estimate over to Dennis for our meeting the next day. Now for lunch!

We spent the early part of the afternoon with a decorator who will help us pull the whole place together and make sure we do not do anything "too" outlandish. As the weather was not conducive to outdoors activities we headed to the fitness center for a quick workout before dinner in Charleston. Our dinner reservation was at McCradys, a popular haunt that more than met our expectations with a delightful atmosphere.

Thursday we woke to a cool (70's) but sunny day, and after a quick breakfast we grabbed our Starbucks and headed to the lighting store where we met with "Crystal Lovelady", a lighting specialist. Crystal had done her homework and walked us through the house plans room by room. We made decisions about pocket lights and placement of the switches - who would have thought there were so many decisions to be made around light placements. This totally sapped my brain cells so we headed for the mall to pass some time and grab a quick lunch before our afternoon meeting wth Dennis.

Back at RobertMorgan Fine Homes, Dennis was waiting for us to run through the designs once more, and discuss changes since our last visit. He also had the estimates from the appliance distibutor - and what a surprise! We are suppose to get builder discounted prices, however the prices were higher than the retail prices David had off of the internet. Catherine, Bob's (the Robert part of RobertMorgan) wife, immediately called another distributor for a second quote that came in at a much better price point. Lesson learned - get more than one quote and do your homework.

Thursday night we headed into town to FIG (Food is Good), another restaurant on our list that we wanted to try. While it was an acceptable meal, it did not meet the same standard as many of the other restaurants we have come to know. Also, we were astonished at the high number of elderly folks (it looked like an early bird special night). This was a first for us, as most of the city restuarants seem to be full of a younger trendy set of patrons (much like ourselves!).

Friday - the cabinet day! Terry our kitchen designer, and a chef prior to getting into kitchen design, did an awesome job of taking the concept we discussed on our last visit, translating it into a kitchen. The cabinetry will be two colors - "espresso and late" (I really am a Starbucks fan!) with fairly straight lines. We still have to decide on counter tops but that can wait to another time. Once we had settled on the kitchen, which took a lot of negotiation (Donna and David), we moved on to the bathrooms. For the master bath, which will have a modern look with an open glass brick shower, we choose suspended cabinetry resting on glass bricks - a great concept that left our designer and Terry very excited. We chose a "Tommy Bahama" theme for the FROG (Room Over the Garage) with a touch of rattan. The other two bathrooms will have a more traditional look, one white and the other a wood shade.

Three hours later, completely sapped, we decided to head to the airport to see if we could catch an early flight home. Unfortunately we could - the reason for the unfortunate part is that we didn't have time to refuel the rental car, and let me tell you, rental car gas is VERY expensive. But it was good to get home for now, as we will return to Charleston in June once the house is framed. Stay tuned.

We Have Signage!

We are official - and the neighbours now know our name!

The long site preparation process is finally over, and our construction crew is ready to start on the house. The picture on the right, of the prepared building site, is a view to the back of the lot. The trees line the edge of the marsh and beyond the marsh is the 18th fairway. On our next visit to Charleston in the middle of April, we will meet with the kitchen designer and the lighting experts to discuss options. More to come....

Our First Selections visit

Taking advantage of the President's Day long weekend, we went down to Charleston for three days to make our first round of selections. This time we went through Dulles airport for some reason and it was not a happy experience. The flight was three hours late and we felt that we were lucky to get off the ground at all. In the future we will probably stick with National airport regardless of price.

The objective of the trip was to pick colors for the shingle siding and for the roof as well as window coloring, plumbing selections and a first run at cabinetry. We did it all and are still married!

Bob Lee, our builder, took us to Kiawah Island, 20 miles south of Charleston, to look at shingle houses to form an opinion on shades and colors. Kiawah has a large number of new shingle homes and is the best place to see a variety of types that are new or which have weathered a few years. We took pictures and obtained the actual color names from the architectural review board (ARB) later. Donna and I narrowed it down to two choices which Bob presented to the Daniel Island ARB the next day. It was tough choosing between the two but we settled on Spanish moss which is in the green/brown range and which will hold its color without any of the tanins bleeding through and little fading. (The actual color is a little darker and has more green in it than this sample from their web site) As a trim, we decided on Elephant tusk which is - you guessed it - an ivory color. Windows will be very close to the shingle color and the metal roof will follow suit. At this time we also selected the type and color of brick.

Next was plumbing. Bob's wife, Catherine, took us to the plumbing supply depot where we discovered that toilets come in different sizes, colors, capacities and all sorts of unimportant stuff. All I remember is that we bought five of them. We also purchased sinks for the kitchen, the bar, the FROG (Family room over the Garage) the bathrooms, BBQ area etc. Donna got a little carried away on a sink for the powder room and wanted one worth $2000, but I was able to reel her in. (So as of now guests will have to wash their hands in the toilet) The bathtub we selected is cool and the fixtures are nice. Importantly, we stayed within the budget. With 90% of the decisions on plumbing now made, we headed to the kitchens & cabinets people. Donna and I had done some research beforehand and had a pretty good idea of what we wanted but were looking for advice on kitchen lay-out and design ideas. The kitchen designer turns out to be a former chef and he will be preparing the elevations for us in time for our next visit when we will see which of the custom manufacturers will be able to provide us with the right mix of style and features we are looking for. We will also be introducing our designer into the mix at this point so that we can ensure that the colors and decorating schemes hang together with the rest of the house. They will also make recommendations for bathroom cabinetry.

Finally we met with Dennis, Bob's point man on our project and Rich who is Wayne's point man to discuss small details such as whether we wanted the hearth elevated or flush with the floor; where to locate the folding stairs to the attic and so on.

But wait, there is more. We were there for three dinners and followed our plan to try a different restaurant every chance we get. The first night was at Tristan's which offers modern american cuisine and is a nice and enjoyable place. The best part was watching the dessert chef prepare her concoctions (I want that job!). Night two was a recommendation from Bob called the Post House at the Old Village in Mount Pleasant (just across the bridge from downtown Charleston) and it turned out to be a quaint Inn with very good food and pleasant ambiance. Finally, we went to 39 Rue de Jean, a French Bistro, loud and busy in a very old building with that decayed look that gives it authenticity. All were good choices.

Welcome

Welcome to David and Donna's home building project in Charleston, S.C.

For those new to the latest Ryan project, a little background. Back in 2002 David and Donna took a road trip along the south eastern seaboard to look at properties for investment. Toward the end of the week we landed in Charleston, S.C, one of our all time favorite places, and fell in love with a new developing community called Daniel Island http://www.danielisland.com. After a fabulous dinner in Charleston and a glass of wine at one of the "hot music spots", it was a done deal - by 8:30 a.m. the next day we were the proud owners of 54 Watroo Point on Daniel Island. At the time we saw this as an investment, however, after many trips to Charleston in the intervening years to check on our "dirt" patch, and with retirement looming, last year we decided to build a custom home in this growing community. Daniel Island is 4000+ acres of land across from downtown historic Charleston that was owned by the Guggenheim family as a hunting preserve for many years. Its is bordered by the Cooper River on one side and the Wando River on the other. In addition to two beautiful golf courses (one by Tom Fazio and the other by Reese Jones) what appealed to us, was the fact that Daniel Island has many neighbourhoods as well as schools and other amenities while still being close to the city. Charleston meets all of our criteria, an airport, hospitals, superb restaurants, cultural activities, universities, charm and, of course, a warm climate. It is a place that people want to visit.

Once we decided to commit to the area, we embarked on selecting an architect. After interviewing several prospective candidates we hired Wayne Windham http://www.waynewindhamarchitect.com to design our Charleston home. Having lived in Asia, Europe, Latin America and various places in the US; in traditional, modern, big and small homes and apartments, we gave Wayne lots of room to be creative and he did not disappoint. Wayne designed a traditional shingle style home in the "Low Country" style that the Architectural Review Board demands. (We will provide a link to the design shortly.) After many iterations of the design in order to bring it down to our price range, we finalized the plans and set about hiring a custom builder.

Following the same process that was so successful in finding Wayne, we began researching Daniel Island builders, visiting their projects and interviewing the principals. In December we selected Robert Morgan Fine Homes, http://www.robertmorganfinehomes.com .

In January we secured our building permit and Phase II (the build) is now underway. As you can see from the first photo - we already have a bathroom - only the finest ammenities! We will add photos and links as we go so that family and friends can follow along with us on this adventure.