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S25E02 Lincolnshire 2024

S25E03 >>> https://dai.ly/x972a8s
Transcript
00:00According to research conducted by me on the internet this morning,
00:04millennials are having a really tough time of it,
00:07thanks to the rest of us.
00:09I mean, they are always on their mobile phones, aren't they?
00:12They want everything handed to them on a plate.
00:14Thank you, Nicky.
00:15They have a thing about avocado toast,
00:18and they have a really poor work ethic.
00:20Look, I think it's about time we put to rest
00:23some of those misconceptions.
00:27Taste of soap.
00:30MUSIC PLAYS
00:51Zara, Singapore born and now 31,
00:55is a professional make-up artist and social media influencer
00:59who's lived in Reading since the age of 13.
01:02I do all the New York Fashion Weeks,
01:04London Fashion Week and Paris Fashion Week.
01:06I do content creation as well,
01:09where essentially I create make-up looks
01:11and teach people how to become their own make-up artists.
01:16Her partner is Giuliano, a 29-year-old gym fanatic
01:19who's been Reading-based for the past six years
01:22and has a whiz-bang job working for a global tech firm.
01:27I travel and work with different clients,
01:29you know, multi-global corporations,
01:31helping them on their journey to move to the cloud
01:34and ultimately digitally transform their business.
01:37In their spare time,
01:38these go-getters somehow also managed to run a healthy snacks business.
01:43Giuliano and I love to cook,
01:44so I think that was a great common thing that we both had.
01:48We work well together.
01:49We are both pretty driven.
01:51I think we always have been.
01:53As driven people often do,
01:56Giuliano and Zara have their sights set on the next challenge.
02:02170 miles from Reading...
02:05I mean, it's really cool. ..in Lincolnshire.
02:09You're walking into the living room.
02:13I always had this dream of potentially building my own home.
02:15Opportunity came up, we were able to find a bit of land.
02:19They've made the move from Reading,
02:21bought a one-acre plot with planning to build a contemporary home
02:25and, naturally, they'll be sharing their story
02:27with other self-builders on social media.
02:31Moving to the countryside in a very remote village
02:33isn't going to be for everybody.
02:35Yeah!
02:37But for us, it's absolutely perfect.
02:40This exciting new chapter kicks off in earnest in early 2023,
02:45as the foundations for their new home are dug.
02:50Hello. Hello.
02:52I do like your site. Thank you.
02:54What do your friends say when you say,
02:56we're moving to Lincolnshire?
02:57I think the first thing is always like, huh?
03:00Was this a long-term plan?
03:01When we were locked up during lockdown, no outdoor space,
03:06we sort of craved, you know, peace, quiet, outdoors, garden space,
03:11and we thought, well, what's stopping us from making that move
03:14to the next chapter of our lives now?
03:16To raise a family, to really put down roots somewhere. Yeah.
03:19And now we can actually call home.
03:21So, you bought an oven-ready site, effectively.
03:24So, just in a nutshell, what are you building?
03:26There was a historical malt house on the site in the 17th century.
03:30Yeah. Malt house? Yes. Yeah.
03:32For making malt to make beer with. Exactly. Yeah.
03:35And so, part of the approval is to reinstate
03:39that historical context that was once here.
03:42How interesting. In the form of a modern home.
03:45We're trying to do our best to very delicately create character,
03:49without it becoming pastiche. Yeah.
03:51Lots of strong, detailed brick buttressing,
03:54uniformed windows on the front,
03:56but then on the rear is when we're allowed to do more
03:58kind of modern, free-range architecture. OK.
04:01And that's the south-facing site. Exactly, yes. Yeah.
04:03It is going to look like a new building. Yeah. Of course.
04:06But at the same time, we want to pay homage and respect
04:08to the history of the site, which I think is important. Nice.
04:12Talents in the worlds of make-up and tech, these two may be,
04:16but Giuliano and Zara have no experience of building anything.
04:20What's to come, like their site, is new territory for them.
04:25Maps from the 1800s show a malt house building on the site.
04:30Planning wanted the placing of Giuliano and Zara's
04:32concrete foundations to mirror that.
04:36Their project, designed by Link's design consultancy,
04:39will also smuggle in a new-built modern home,
04:42slotting it behind the camouflage of a traditional building.
04:46And it's all off the scale.
04:48Sizable pre-insulated timber panels made off-site
04:52will deliver an energy-efficient two-storey, 400-square-metre home.
04:57The malt house aesthetic will come from 25,000 handmade bricks,
05:02some distinctive brick piers, typical narrow windows and a slate roof.
05:07And then, audaciously slicing through the malt house,
05:10a glass and corten steel portal will connect the front door
05:14to an oversized statement, a giant 30-metre wooden pergola
05:18next to an equally large pond.
05:21On one side of the hall will sit a large kitchen-diner,
05:25with a wall of glazing overlooking the garden.
05:28At the far end of the house will be utility spaces and a garage,
05:32and in the middle, the sitting room, a triple-height space
05:36with an overhead walkway strung across it.
05:39Upstairs, you'll find Giuliano and Zara's bedroom,
05:43with an en-suite, a walk-in wardrobe and a make-up studio for Zara.
05:48Across the floating walkway, Giuliano's office will overlook the sitting room.
05:52Beyond it are two spare bedrooms for Redditors to stay and the family to grow.
05:57And outside, there is more.
05:59Beyond the pergola, there'll be a garden room, a greenhouse,
06:03a fruit and veg patch and beehives.
06:06This isn't just a new home.
06:08It's a whole new world and way of life.
06:11So Giuliano and Zara had better make sure whoever builds it for them
06:15knows what they're doing.
06:21I'll be project managing the overall process.
06:24And do you bring experience of project management too?
06:27Experience of project management, but not specifically related to construction.
06:32Running a project in IT is clearly not the same as putting a building up in the wet.
06:38We've done our best to fix price to all of the contracts.
06:41So there shouldn't be any fluctuation or surprises, hopefully.
06:45So the groundworks team, for example, take full responsibility
06:48of getting the site ready for the timber frame company,
06:52who will project manage that stage and basically get us to a watertight shelf.
06:56How much do you pay for this land? This beautiful acre?
06:58£135,000.
07:02Sorry? £135,000?
07:03£135,000?
07:06We did our research.
07:07Yeah, we did our research and the farmer who owned it helped us out, obviously,
07:12by giving us a good deal.
07:14Even so, how much are you going to spend on the house itself, building it?
07:18£700,000.
07:19That's all in, is it?
07:20All in, and that includes a contingency as well.
07:23That's everything?
07:24£700,000, tops.
07:26Plus £135,000 for the land, that's £835,000.
07:31Where does all that come from?
07:32So most of the build cost will come from a mortgage.
07:36So the mortgage is £660,000.
07:38At current rates, that's a phenomenal amount of money, because...
07:42Well, standard bank rates might be, say, £4,500 at the moment,
07:45but for self-build, I imagine it's quite a bit more.
07:49Yes. How much are they charging you?
07:51So close to 7% now.
07:53Jeez.
07:54It's around £3,000 a month.
07:57OK, so you really, really do want to finish quickly.
08:01Because you could save yourself a stack load of cash by finishing early,
08:06terminating that self-build mortgage early,
08:09and then presumably converting to a standard rate.
08:10Correct, yes.
08:12And how long is that going to take, then?
08:14From start to end with the build?
08:16Yeah.
08:17It'll be 18 months.
08:1818 months.
08:19So £40,000 in interest across the project.
08:2118-month project.
08:23If it goes over, you'll be really cursing, won't you?
08:27You don't want it to go over?
08:28No.
08:29You don't want it to cost more?
08:30Ideally not, no.
08:33It all sounds so straightforward, doesn't it?
08:37Well, all this is incredibly well-organised.
08:40I can't keep pace with Giuliano and Zara's organisation,
08:45the number of ventures and businesses and plans that they all have.
08:48And quite clearly, they are so well-organised and work so hard
08:52that they've been able to create clear boundaries
08:56around all of their projects to contain them.
08:59The thing is, though, is that building does not respect boundaries.
09:04The process of putting a house up is...
09:08..it's traditional, it's fraught, it's highly complex,
09:12it's always specific to a site, it's full of problems.
09:16And as a result, it respects no man or woman's boundaries.
09:21It fills your life with chaos and worry.
09:27And that's what's going to happen here.
09:30It is mere hours before the first problem rears its head.
09:35Thanks to a row of conifers on site,
09:37building control have stipulated that the nearby foundations
09:40be dug down two metres, far deeper than anticipated.
09:45How many more cubic metres of concrete are you going to have to then buy?
09:49Probably looking at a good ten cube, possibly more.
09:52So, your client's paying?
09:54More than likely, yeah.
09:55I love the idea of the fixed-price contract.
09:57For a fixed-price specification,
09:59but when the specification changes, well, then...
10:01Yeah, it needs to change the price, yeah.
10:03Yeah.
10:04The groundworks were supposed to cost 30 grand, but not any more.
10:10It's a fair bit more concrete,
10:11maybe close to £4,000 of extra concrete.
10:14Unfortunately, it's just one of those costs that we've had to swallow.
10:16It's never fun just pouring more unnecessarily money into the ground.
10:21Just three days later, the deeper concrete strip foundations,
10:25all 160 metres of them, are poured.
10:29A job so epic, it ends up going on late into the evening,
10:33while Giuliano's living in this tiny studio flat near the site,
10:38somehow holding down a full-time tech job as well as project managing.
10:44100 miles away in Northamptonshire,
10:47Zara's getting used to degenerating her social media content
10:50from Giuliano's mum and dad's.
10:53Long-wearing...
10:54Ah! Damn it!
10:56In the house where he grew up.
11:00The one I'm using is a moisturiser and primer in one,
11:03so this is amazing.
11:05A great pro tip is to let your concealer set for about two minutes,
11:09if you have time, and I edit it later.
11:13But why can't she do this influencing in Lincolnshire?
11:17With my job, I have a lot of products,
11:21and I would take up the whole entire place
11:24if I brought everything with me.
11:26If I were to bring this all to Lincolnshire,
11:28I think Giuliano might have a heart attack.
11:32She'll be back in Lincolnshire at weekends,
11:34and living separately is a sacrifice Zara's determined will be short-lived.
11:40The moment that we can solidly live in there,
11:43I absolutely do not care if I have to sleep on the floor.
11:46Personally, I'm hoping October I'll be able to move in.
11:51Hold on, that's only six months away.
11:57Then again, this project's going gangbusters.
12:00Just weeks in, the block and beam floor is being installed
12:04and the timber frame is arriving in ten days' time.
12:09Trying to bring a bit of efficiency as much as I can into construction,
12:12streamline the process as best as I can.
12:15And that includes doing anything Giuliano can on site,
12:19before and after the working day, to keep things moving.
12:23When I'm arranging these bricks for the bricklayers,
12:25face side is up, that way they're not having to faff around.
12:29Half a second saved and make their lives ten times easier.
12:34But a few days later, a problem surfaces.
12:37The foundations are supposed to be complete,
12:39but a vital job's been left undone.
12:42The perimeter levelling of the foundations in block work
12:45around the whole building.
12:47The ground workers' team said it's not in their responsibility
12:50and they're not bricklayers, so they wouldn't do it.
12:52The brickies on site have said that ground workers' teams would do it.
12:55That's not going to solve the problem, though, is it?
12:58And that's something that Zara and I are both learning about
13:00as we go through this process.
13:03That fraught complexity and incipient chaos I warned of
13:08is beginning to set in.
13:11This project needs the guiding hand of experience.
13:28In Lincolnshire, Giuliano and Zara have found an unlikely ally
13:32to help them fit the concrete blocks
13:34around the perimeter of their foundations.
13:36It's dried up beautiful, hasn't it?
13:38Jim, the son of the farmer who sold them the land,
13:42just so happens to be an experienced builder.
13:44All right, I'll get a mix on them.
13:45I'm looking at you like a proud brother, that's what I'm looking at.
13:49You're the brother I never had, Jim.
13:51I know, I do have a brother.
13:53Don't tell him I said that.
13:55Jim's help is costing £3,000 that wasn't in the budget.
14:00But without his experience, this project may well have just run adrift.
14:05Jim provides the trusted ear and the technical expertise.
14:08When Jim says something, I can bet my bottoms all of that it's true.
14:12Isn't that right, Jim? Yeah. Yeah, it is.
14:16170 miles from Reading, they're already making new friends.
14:22As to what's propelled them to move here now,
14:24while still relatively young,
14:26it transpires there's a powerful personal motivator.
14:30Most people think about self-build as a project they might do one day,
14:35but most people don't do it.
14:37My mum, very out of the blue,
14:43died just from a brain haemorrhage from nowhere.
14:47Yeah. It's just a massive shock.
14:52And I don't know if that's really sunken fully in yet.
14:55And I don't know if it ever will.
14:57When she passed, she hadn't even retired.
14:59It's events like that that happen in your life,
15:02that that's just when you kind of like think to yourself,
15:05you just have to grab life.
15:10It's just like anything can happen tomorrow.
15:16That's an inspiring ethos, which helps explain why just six weeks in
15:21and 40 grand spent on foundations and scaffolding,
15:25their 160-grand timber frame turns up from whole.
15:30Almost a third of the entire budget now gone.
15:35Now we actually start seeing what is essentially the beginnings of the house
15:38and within 20 days Turner's Timber should be able to get us to watertight stage.
15:44Only it's not long before the frame installation manager, Matt,
15:48spots another potential hiccup in the height of the foundations.
15:52A little bit off.
15:53It does get a little bit worse as you go around checking it, to be honest, yeah.
15:57You'd like to think if it was a main contractor,
15:59then levels and things like that would have been checked.
16:01If somebody doing it for the first time,
16:03you don't really know what to look out for and not, do you?
16:08It's not an ideal situation, but the discrepancy is within tolerance.
16:12The access track onto site isn't level either,
16:15so manoeuvring materials around is tricky
16:17and there's a 55-tonne crane arriving tomorrow.
16:21It's really soft.
16:22It's obviously we've had bad weather,
16:24so as we've been running the telehandler in today,
16:26you can see it's just causing ruts in the site.
16:30And when we bring a crane in, it's a hell of a lot heavier than a telehandler.
16:36Jim, of course, is on hand to save the day.
16:40Driving lesson, then, go on.
16:41And give Giuliano a crash course in driving a three-tonne roller.
16:45Renting it's added a further £200 to the budget.
16:49Push it forward to go forward, pull it back to go back.
16:52This button on here is to vibrate and you want it vibrating.
16:56Yeah, and it'll start going again.
16:57It wants to be absolutely flat out.
16:58Compact it better.
17:00OK.
17:01Yeah.
17:01A little bit nervous, but...
17:03Just do this bit if you feel more comfortable for a start while you are.
17:07OK.
17:08That's it.
17:11Yeah, he'll be all right. He'll be spot on.
17:13He's a fast learner, isn't he?
17:15Well, he's got to be.
17:16Giuliano's schedule doesn't allow for on-the-job training.
17:20Yet, come the afternoon, there's some good news.
17:24A solution to the not-entirely-level foundations.
17:27Now we've laid our soleplate round.
17:29This point here is five mil higher than the rest of the slab.
17:32So rather than packing the rest of the soleplate up to that level,
17:35we're going to just reduce that bit.
17:37So we're going to run a planer over it to bring a little bit of the soleplate down,
17:40to then bring everything back to level.
17:44Come day two, with the help of the crane...
17:47I'll bring it in on an angle, see how we get on.
17:49..and that freshly compacted ground,
17:52the timber structure rockets up in no time.
17:54176 timber panelled in all,
17:58as well as a series of chunky steel beams
18:00that facilitate the home's open plan layout.
18:03It's a bit awkward, isn't it?
18:05Yeah. That, I'm short by five mil.
18:11Yeah, that's nice.
18:12But this is the easy bit.
18:14Yeah, go for that one.
18:15When you remember that this big timber frame structure
18:18has to end up something like this vast industrial brick bolthouse
18:23near Birmingham, an endangered historic building that dates from the 1870s.
18:29Its telltale details include buttressing brick piers
18:33to strengthen the walls and support the load of the grain on the upper floors
18:37and also small windows, like wasn't needed for the barley to germinate.
18:43But of course, the most striking quality,
18:46the hardest to emulate with new brickwork,
18:48is its time-worn character, its age.
18:52Remarkable, isn't it, how we connect to decay?
18:55The idea that as buildings slowly rot away,
18:59that there is a kind of natural sort of patination,
19:02a kind of creation of interest in the surface texture.
19:05No wonder, then, that we decide we want to live in houses
19:09that look older than they are,
19:11that we want to buy distressed and patinated furniture
19:15to create a false sense of history in our lives,
19:18to connect us to place and to time,
19:20that we even decide to buy clothes which come pre-distressed.
19:27Maybe Giuliano and Sara will find a way to distress bricks
19:30to give them a similar patina of age.
19:34Well, they already have.
19:35This facility in Shropshire is distressing their bricks right now.
19:40Shall we have a look? Yeah, yeah, have a look.
19:42First, the new bricks are sprayed with either a light or dark pigment.
19:47Oh, look at that. There's a slight sooting.
19:50Yes, make it very subtle and replicate the way a brick would
19:54naturally weather over perhaps a hundred years. That's the idea.
19:58Next, a key ingredient is added
20:01to suggest the bricks have been reclaimed from an old wall.
20:04What he's now doing is he's dabbing the bricks by hand
20:07with a yellow sand and white cement mix.
20:10This reproduces the effect of mortar.
20:14This is, I mean, this is what he's applying, is mortar onto the back of the brick.
20:17Yeah, correct.
20:20Finally, they're put in an enormous tumbling machine to rough up their edges.
20:28It's great.
20:29They look like they've come out of an old building.
20:32An epic 25,000 tumbled bricks are needed to clear Giuliano
20:37and Zara's timber frame.
20:40A job Giuliano's tasked to the brothers Nathan and Ash,
20:44who he naturally discovered on social media.
20:48Good to meet you.
20:49Yeah, I think it looks bigger than it is because it's it's wide,
20:52but it's quite it's quite thin, right?
20:53Yeah, it's a good size.
20:55Yeah, good size.
20:57There's 52 pallets.
20:59Nice.
21:00That's because I said, what's what's what does 25,000 bricks look like?
21:03And they said 52 pallets.
21:04And I was like, OK.
21:07And then hopefully we get good weather for the entire run of bricks.
21:10Well, they say it's.
21:11No, don't say anything, Ash.
21:13Jinxed it.
21:14Yeah.
21:15Ready to go?
21:15Yeah.
21:17Nathan and Ash reckon the gargantuan task will take eight weeks.
21:22All slightly different sizes all over the shop.
21:25I mean, each one.
21:26Look at that.
21:27That's quite extreme.
21:29Giuliano would happily have that side in as a face.
21:32This one?
21:33Yeah.
21:34He says the rougher, the better, he said.
21:36That one right above his front door.
21:38Go on, just to annoy him.
21:43Whether this ends up looking authentic or a bit of a muddle
21:47is not on Giuliano and Zara's radar because they're too busy
21:51carrying 10 grand's worth of roof slate up ladders in backpacks,
21:56nine at a time, as documented on social media, of course.
22:01So the purpose of doing this?
22:02We were told by the timber frame manufacturer,
22:04before the brickwork gets too high, you need to have the roof on
22:09or at least the weight on the roof so that it compresses the kit down.
22:14Yeah.
22:15We had the option of telling the brickies, OK, pull back away for two weeks
22:18and come back when the roof's done.
22:21Or alternatively.
22:22You do it. Yes.
22:24Wow.
22:25You've effectively mimicked the full effect of the finished roof there.
22:28Exactly.
22:30In truth, I'm starting to admire these two influencers.
22:34They know how to really graft and their labours, motivated as they are
22:38by such a desire to be living here in October, are propelling
22:42this project forwards.
22:44Heroically, Nathan and Ash complete their vast brickwork job
22:48in the anticipated eight weeks.
22:50And the first roofing slates are laid, bang on schedule.
22:55And come August, contractors arrive to install 80,000 pounds worth of glass.
23:00Goodness me, I might have to eat humble pie.
23:02This project is flying.
23:05Such a big piece of single glass.
23:07Always a bit nerve wracking watching.
23:11The largest pain for the first floor landing weighs three quarters of a ton.
23:16And I thought doing eyeliner was stressful.
23:18Gosh, this is much more of a steady hand.
23:20If touch wood anything happens, it's a it's a major delay.
23:25So I think there's just so much
23:28running on this moment.
23:30Just come and come in with the main boom, Gary.
23:32You can slew left a bit if you like, Gary.
23:34That's Gary's left.
23:36Yeah, Gary, Gary, Gary.
23:40Pull us straight back into the frame.
23:42Well, that'll do fine. That's it. Wow. Wow.
23:46Look at that. That is awesome.
23:49That is a window and a half. Wow.
23:54But there is a frustrating snag.
23:58The window fitters couldn't install the roof lights
24:01as the panel supplied didn't fit.
24:05Right now, we can't do anything in the living room
24:08because that's not properly watertight when we get heavy rain.
24:11It's not properly watertight to start doing plaster boarding.
24:14So it's pushed us back, which is a tad annoying.
24:18It's going to take time to make new panels.
24:21And that has put paid to them moving in in October.
24:25Ouch.
24:36In Lincolnshire, autumn's approaching
24:39by the time the right size windows are fitted,
24:42allowing for full steam ahead with the interior fit out.
24:45Plastering walls, screeding floors
24:48and whatever jobs Giuliano and Zara can turn their hands to.
24:52We're trying to be as invested in the process as much as we can.
24:56Every hour that we spend on site means that
24:59we're one step closer to being moved in.
25:02And there's a new urgency to getting moved in as soon as possible.
25:06I've learned to have to live in chaos for a little while.
25:09It's all hands to the pups.
25:12Zara's even moved into the tiny studio with Giuliano near the site,
25:16something she hadn't originally anticipated.
25:19I don't think I realise how long these things take.
25:22When we first started, obviously things went up quite quick.
25:26And now it's sort of everything's a little slower
25:30because they're more intricate details.
25:33The desperation to get in is prominent.
25:36Which makes it all the more surreal
25:39to see an entirely new structure being built in the garden.
25:45It's took us four days so far.
25:48It's very rare we install pergolas as big as it is.
25:53I get heavier.
25:55The scale of it, it's very large.
25:59It's not what we're used to.
26:01The pergola's costing £20,000.
26:04That's really cool.
26:06Oh, my word. What is that?
26:09That... Surely that's not meant to be here, is it?
26:13That's huge.
26:15It's like they're constructing not so much a garden,
26:19but a garden centre.
26:21It begs the question, why?
26:25Hello. He shouted down the mile-long pergola.
26:29It's got an amazing acoustic.
26:31I knew you were going to build a pergola,
26:33but I didn't know it was going to be quite as impressive.
26:37I've seen structures like this in car parks and large hotels,
26:41and you're going to have kind of like 50 chairs laid out for breakfast.
26:46What's the plan here? You're not going to be doing that.
26:49No, we're not.
26:51We're just going to have decking down all the way through.
26:55Hopefully a hot tub at the end.
26:57Hopefully. We can afford it.
26:59Yeah, so the idea of the pergola is to really create a permanent feature
27:04that ties the house to the landscape,
27:07because otherwise it would just be a garden.
27:10What's wrong with a garden?
27:12Ordinarily, people finish their houses
27:14and then they think about the landscape and turn their attentions outside.
27:18We had to do the pergola first, actually,
27:21so that we could get the measurements for the corten.
27:24So the corten steel, rusty metal... Yes.
27:27..is going on the front of the building and on the back,
27:30on both portals, is that right?
27:32Yes, the corten will go on both portals
27:34and then also on the inside of the hallway and the landing as well.
27:38Run through? Run through to create that visual illusion
27:42that the corten portal is punched through.
27:45Yeah, nice.
27:47Yet, having drawn down a scary £580,000 of their mortgage,
27:54they're having to work as hard as they've ever worked
27:57to finance this project.
27:59I will be very glad to not live out of a suitcase.
28:04I have been doing that for a very, very long time now.
28:07So I have a pretty heavy week this week
28:11because I'm travelling all over the UK.
28:15Drive safe. Thanks.
28:17Love you. Bye. Love you too.
28:26Doing this, the travelling back and forth, it's definitely hard, I think.
28:30It takes a toll physically because I'm driving so much
28:36and away so much and I absolutely, like, I love my job,
28:40but I think now having the build on top of it
28:44and then the business on top of it, it's a lot of pressure.
28:48As Zara heads to a make-up gig in Greenwich...
28:53..back in Lincolnshire, Giuliano's also on an important mission...
28:57KNOCK AT DOOR
28:59..to visit the local farmer, Steve.
29:01Morning. Steve, how are we doing? Well, thanks.
29:04These two have developed an unlikely friendship over the last few months.
29:08Zara baked some cookies. Oh, that's perfect.
29:11How's Zara? Yeah, she's all right.
29:13She had a bit of an early start this morning.
29:15How did she? Where's she gone?
29:17Gone to London, but she had to wake up at two.
29:20Ooh. I wondered if your time was to hear,
29:23just have a look at the emails or the Wi-Fi, if that's OK.
29:27Yeah, absolutely.
29:29Steve lends Giuliano the odd telehandler or digger on site
29:33and, in exchange, tech wizard Giuliano helps out with Steve's IT problems.
29:38Sometimes he'll say,
29:39oh, I haven't got any emails in the past four days or something.
29:43It's been quite handy having Giuliano on the doorstep.
29:46Nice to see a bit of youth and vitality entering the area, I think.
29:52You know, they're modest and understated
29:54and I think they're a welcome addition to the community, I think.
30:04Come November, some of the interior finishes begin...
30:09So nice.
30:10..starting with a refined micro-concrete floor.
30:14Only, it transpires, this is the second attempt at the floor.
30:18So, the whole kitchen-diner and the entrance hall,
30:21that was all done to top coat.
30:23We came in the next morning and, yeah, Giuliano wasn't 100% happy.
30:27It's taken longer, I'm over, by a week, maybe two,
30:30but I'm glad we got there eventually.
30:32Another major tweak is afoot at this late stage in the garage.
30:36So, oh, you can get a good car in here, a wide car, or two tiny ones.
30:41Yeah. What's the plan?
30:43No cars. No cars. No cars.
30:45Not to get a car in here any more.
30:46This is going to be our home gym.
30:48We can't put the dumbbells in the living room, though, can we?
30:51Yeah, like hundreds of thousands of other people in this country,
30:54you're putting the gym in the garage.
30:56Yeah.
30:58But one element that won't change is the rusty Corten steel portal frame,
31:03a slice of where fashion meets architecture.
31:07Once the Corten's on, it's just going to really pull it together.
31:11I'm so excited!
31:13But money is so tight and the Corten's so expensive,
31:18up to 50 grand to supply and fit,
31:20Giuliano and Zara have decided to take a big gamble
31:23on measuring and fitting it themselves.
31:26We wouldn't have ideally liked to have done the measurements ourselves
31:30because there's always a risk of whenever you do measurements yourself
31:33it not fits incorrectly.
31:35102.4.
31:37This bit here?
31:38No, no, no.
31:39This bit?
31:40Yeah, that rounded bit.
31:41But the Corten company that we're working with,
31:43we asked how much the site measure would be
31:45and they said, oh, that'll be thousands and thousands.
31:47Yeah, I'm not paying thousands and thousands of pounds for a site measurement.
31:51No, I think it's up.
31:53Check the drawing.
31:54We've measured it as accurately as we can.
31:56We've done our best.
31:58We'll just see.
32:00The Corten is being fabricated at this workshop in Bedfordshire
32:04for £15,000.
32:06We've got a 4 kilowatt fibre laser
32:08which will cut up to 1 inch thick mild steel
32:12within a 0.1 of a millimetre tolerance.
32:14The risk of taking those aspects on yourself
32:17and not relying on someone else
32:19and paying for someone else to do it
32:21is if something goes wrong.
32:22It could end up costing you some more money at the end of it.
32:24It's a lot of metal.
32:25I think it's in the region of four or five tonnes in total
32:28or something of metal.
32:29So it's quite a job to install it.
32:31So I admire them both fantastically for doing it.
32:34But it's not like wood.
32:35You can't just shave a little bit off.
32:37So fingers crossed it will all go to plan.
32:41Four weeks later,
32:43installation has begun, sort of.
32:47Our measurements have perhaps could have been a bit more accurate.
32:51Could this be a challenge too far,
32:53even for dependable Jim?
32:55Say the brickwork's out 3mm,
32:57the timber frame's out 3mm the other way,
32:59combined it's 6mm,
33:00so all of a sudden you've got a 6mm gap.
33:02Doesn't fit.
33:03Doesn't fit.
33:05Why's it not going?
33:07None of us have done anything like this before.
33:10Oh, bugger.
33:11I'm not going to lie, it is tricky.
33:13Yeah, but that looks rough like that does.
33:15Rough, properly rough.
33:17Has all this been a brilliant strategy or a false economy
33:20in the appearance of the entire house?
33:22Only time and the rusting of the steel will tell.
33:25We're not going to get any better than that.
33:27No.
33:43Giuliano and Zara took a step into the unknown
33:46when they upped sticks from the comfortable home counties
33:49to the Lincolnshire world
33:51and set about building a new home 16 months ago.
33:55I'm very much looking forward to seeing this project finished,
33:58you know?
33:59I mean, partly because of the building,
34:01it touched an unusual shape, long and thin,
34:03on the footprint of that old malt house.
34:05And that's going to set up all kinds of unusual, I don't know,
34:08engagement through the building with the landscape behind it.
34:11I want it to be theatrical.
34:14I want it to be not just the usual, modest,
34:20Lincolnshire house on a long road.
34:23I want it to have presence.
34:28To be fair to Giuliano and Zara,
34:30they did say it would take 18 months,
34:32but I'm here two months early, so is it even finished?
34:40HE CHUCKLES
34:42Nice.
34:44Of course it is.
34:48So sharp.
34:53It puts on quite a show.
34:56Well, it's all beautifully done and very tightly finished,
34:59and that long shape of the malt house on this footprint,
35:03that's really good.
35:05There are the brick piers and the small windows piercing it rhythmically,
35:09and in the middle of it is this great piece of theatre.
35:12This steel box, very, very well done,
35:16but it's thrust right through the middle of all this softness.
35:20It's quite an aggressive, energetic statement.
35:23Think of it what you will.
35:25Ah! Hello. Hello.
35:27Both of you, how are you, Zara? Good.
35:29Good to see you. Nice to see you.
35:31You're looking really well. Thank you so much.
35:33Fair of you. And you, Giuliano, how are you? Good.
35:35How long have you been living here? We moved in in May.
35:37It's great. The whole building is so crisp.
35:39I was unsure about the bricks,
35:41but in a way they've been upstaged by the quartet,
35:44so they're quite subtle.
35:46They push back.
35:48How tough has it been?
35:50It's been tough. It's tough.
35:52Yeah.
35:54We've spent so much time and effort
35:56getting involved in every stage of the process.
35:58There's a handmade feel to it.
36:01Very handmade feel.
36:03We like to say, come and have a look, but don't look too close.
36:06Can we see inside? Absolutely. Come in.
36:10Nice.
36:12Well-proportioned, small front door.
36:15So solid, though, cos it's sealed like the quartet.
36:18Oh, blimey, and that just carries on all the way through.
36:21Oh, that's brilliant.
36:23It's really strong.
36:25That's quite something.
36:27And the ceiling here is running to join with the pergola,
36:30which is the most fantastically majestic exercise in perspective.
36:35And it's ready and waiting for the aircraft to land, yeah?
36:39What's that? Oh, my word, it's a living chandelier.
36:42Yeah.
36:44I really wanted to bring the feel of Singapore,
36:47cos there's an amazing place there called Gardens by the Bay
36:50and that just reminds me of it.
36:52What a lovely thing to bring that here.
36:56This almost civic-scale entrance hall...
36:59Oh, yeah.
37:01..leads directly to the restaurant-sized kitchen diner.
37:05It's very strong.
37:07Nice big spaces.
37:09I could never bring myself to paint a ceiling that colour.
37:12I paint all my ceilings white, you know, how dark?
37:15But this is amazing.
37:17The table's fabulous.
37:19It's like just a big slice through a tree.
37:21Yeah, that is exactly what it is.
37:23Where's it from? Vietnam.
37:25We work with a company who salvage trees that have been left to rot.
37:30So it's quite a sustainable way of making something quite beautiful
37:34from something that would have been lost.
37:36The table was very important
37:38because my mum always talked about having a round table.
37:41When you're on a circle, you speak to everyone,
37:43everybody's involved in the conversation.
37:45It's a good thing.
37:47And you've got a really interesting heritage between the two of you,
37:50haven't you? And it's kind of... It's intercontinental.
37:53It is. It's a bit of everything, really, isn't it?
37:56South American...
37:58We're from Asia, half Asian, half Indian Kenyan.
38:01All of the spaces are quite open
38:03to allow family to connect with one another
38:06and that's such an important thing in both of our cultures.
38:09Yeah, so having family to stay... Exactly.
38:12..is important here. Absolutely.
38:14So, kitchen over there.
38:16Have you designed it for the food business?
38:18We have. When you run a food business,
38:20you have to have all of those things to make sure that, you know,
38:23you're separating everything.
38:25What's that beam? Surely that's not a piece of wood.
38:28No, it's a false beam, which has been sculpted and made on site.
38:33In what? Just plaster.
38:35It's hugely persuasive.
38:37I mean, the colouring is brilliant and also the detailing.
38:41It's naughty, really.
38:43I mean, it's straight out of Pinewood Studios, 1956, that.
38:46Yeah. Amazing.
38:48To the other side of the hall sits the impossibly high sitting room,
38:52open right up to the building's ridge.
38:54Lovely room.
38:56Lovely view of the pod.
38:59And then you get this extra layer above there through that glazing.
39:05You've got all this contact with the sky.
39:07The space comes into its own.
39:10And everything that's on there is all my mum.
39:15And that's her? Yes, that's my mum.
39:19Yeah, yeah, lovely. What a lovely scene.
39:22Also down here are a bathroom, utility room
39:26and that all-important former garage gym.
39:29While upstairs, the usually more humdrum spaces...
39:33Oh, wow!
39:35..are here anything but.
39:38It's quite hard to describe this experience, isn't it?
39:41Yeah.
39:43It's like you're outside.
39:45These must be some of the largest sheets of glass you can get.
39:50They are commercial-scale units.
39:52Yeah. Works brilliantly.
39:54And it's all the more strongly framed by the steel.
39:59Oh, and then this.
40:01Yes, there's yet more drama,
40:04thanks to the suspended walkway above the sitting room.
40:07What I love about this is the fact that they've always set off the wall.
40:11Mm-hm. It's a flying bridge.
40:15So there's a sort of element of suspense, I mean, literally.
40:19Drama in that.
40:21Of course, Giuliano and Zara's bedroom is up here too.
40:25Arguably, what is most important
40:27is Zara's permanent make-up studio next door.
40:30So, north-facing window?
40:32North-facing. North-facing creates a steady light,
40:36natural light, all through the day.
40:38Is that a tripod? That is a small tripod.
40:40That is my... Yeah, my tripod.
40:42Before, when I was filming, I would have to do essentially a balancing act.
40:46I'd have to pile up books.
40:48And now, filming is just...easy.
40:51One of my most favourite views, and you'll love,
40:54is looking down this extremely long corridor,
40:57because it's an extremely long building, at a toilet pad.
41:00The internal doors haven't arrived yet.
41:04Maybe they shouldn't.
41:08Also on the far side of the walkway is Giuliano's office
41:12and two guest or future family bedrooms,
41:15which to some extent explains the staggering size of this place.
41:21It's a miracle that they built it in under 18 months.
41:24But they did have the help of countless others too,
41:28especially Jim.
41:30When they met you, things fell into place?
41:32It's surprising how things happen, yeah.
41:34Somebody to hold his hand through the process, guide it, build it.
41:37I distinctly remember a Sunday evening,
41:39the poor lad was nearly in tears, and then from then,
41:42yeah, here we are, this is it.
41:44Yeah, we've worked well as a team.
41:46He got stuck in, credit where credit's due, in the core ten.
41:49Me and Giuliano tackled that, we did that.
41:51I have to say, I've been looking for the faults in the core ten
41:54and I can't find them.
41:56Please look harder, Kevin.
41:58Are they there?
42:00Yeah, if you can't find fault, I'm happy.
42:02No, it's worked well, it has, it's worked well.
42:04Constructing any building, especially one on this scale,
42:07comes at a cost, and not just financial.
42:10It's probably been the toughest thing that I've done and we've done.
42:14Yeah, I think I probably went into construction
42:17maybe with a bit of delusion, I don't know,
42:20thinking that each stage of the project would align nicely,
42:25but that certainly wasn't the case.
42:28But it really does suck up every single moment of free time that you have.
42:33We've had to give up every single weekend for the past 14 months.
42:38Zara, for example, I have no idea how she functions on three hours of sleep.
42:42I don't know how many couples could do this.
42:45Tell me about money. You wanted to be in for 700,000.
42:49623.
42:51No, no, no. You've come in under.
42:54Yeah.
42:56How?
42:57Our hand's been forced by the state of the economy and interest rates
43:00and it basically doubled in interest.
43:02We started to get to thinking, OK, can we even afford the monthly payments?
43:07And so we made the decision to not take down the last stage of the mortgage
43:14and try and finish it as much as we could on our own.
43:21I've always been told nothing is given, you have to earn it,
43:24and so we've had to sacrifice big time for this.
43:28We have.
43:29Tell me, your mum, what would she think of it?
43:32Oh, my gosh.
43:34My mum, I think she'd just love it so much.
43:40I think she'd be extremely proud.
43:44It's come in ahead of programme and it's come in under budget.
43:48Credit where credit is due.
43:50Very, very well done.
43:53Giuliano and Zara's tenacity, resilience and sacrifice
43:58have more than left a mark on this home.
44:04There's a commonly held belief that if you want to self-build,
44:07you've got to be of mature years, have wisdom and experience,
44:11be in your 40s or even your 60s.
44:14I don't think that's the case at all.
44:16I think you need to be in your 30s or even your 20s,
44:19because, yes, it does help if you've got project management experience.
44:23Giuliano does.
44:24It does help if you've got a bit of a pioneering spirit.
44:27Well, both Zara and he have that.
44:30But what's really needed is energy, and vast amounts of it,
44:35and fitness and stamina.
44:37And, goodness me, have these two demonstrated
44:41all of those qualities in droves.
44:43They've brought such resource to this project.
44:47And not only that, in collaborating so tightly,
44:51in sharing all the physical jobs,
44:54like lifting slates onto the roof and blocks into the ground,
44:58they've actually multiplied the energy, as it were, of the project.
45:04They've actually shared that spirit with the local community here,
45:09brought people along with them to help them out.
45:12So it's paid dividends in the end.
45:15And it's also reshaped my view of millennials.
45:19I mean, goodness me.
45:21I'm not sure if I could do what they've done here.
45:26Could you?
45:28No.
45:30I'd take my hard hat off to them.
45:40This has had to happen because of my disability.
45:43I just don't want to get it wrong.
45:45I don't want it to look it's made for a wheelchair.
45:47At the minute, it does feel a bit never-ending.
45:50The fiberglass are completely dry.
45:52If there's any water on there, the resin will not cure.
45:54Everything is very wet.
45:56You suffered a baptism of fiberglass.
45:59That's going to take a lot more work and money.
46:01We're going to be skinny.
46:03It's just a bit difficult sometimes.