Two builds, documented from the site survey to the last invoice

01The site

The nearest three-phase pole was 1,900 ft downhill and the connection quote came back at more than the cost of the house. The plot fell nine per cent across its width, the access track would not take a concrete truck, and the county required a permanent-dwelling application rather than a recreational structure, which meant stamped structural calculations for a site with a design wind speed of 110 mph.

02What we did

We took concrete out of the equation entirely. The unit sits on twelve helical screw piles installed in a single day by a two-person crew with a mini-excavator, which levelled the nine per cent fall without a retaining structure. The solar frame was welded to the container corner castings in the yard and wind-rated as part of the structural submission, so it went in as one package rather than a later amendment. The battery bank sits in a conditioned service bay off the plant room, sized for four consecutive days without generation. Rainwater feeds a 1,500 gallon buried cistern and a four-stage filter to potable standard.

01The site

The lot was a leftover corner parcel between two 1920s bungalows, too narrow for a conventional build and overlooked on three sides. The clients wanted a genuinely open living floor, which meant deleting the shared long wall between two 40 ft containers, the exact element that gives a container its racking resistance. The first planning submission was refused on character grounds, with the officer citing the visible corrugation as incongruous with the street.

02What we did

The removed party wall was replaced with a welded moment frame at 8 ft centres, sized by our engineer and stamped for submission, which gave a clear 16 ft span with no column in the living floor. On the character objection we resubmitted with the street elevation clad in vertical charred cedar and the corrugated steel left exposed only on the courtyard side, so the building reads as timber from the sidewalk and as steel from inside its own plot. Glazing was pushed to the two elevations that were not overlooked, and the roof was pitched to drain away from the shared boundary to close out the neighbour objections.