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Green house: what was it about this normal-looking suburban dwelling, price tag $1.2 million, that caused such a kerfuffle at city hall? Perhaps it was the walls made of straw bales

Toronto life, 2004-10, Vol.34 (10), p.110

Copyright Toronto Life Publishing Company Oct 2004 ;ISSN: 0049-4194

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  • Title:
    Green house: what was it about this normal-looking suburban dwelling, price tag $1.2 million, that caused such a kerfuffle at city hall? Perhaps it was the walls made of straw bales
  • Author: Ashenburg, Katherine
  • Subjects: Bradbee, Cheryl ; Design ; Home building ; Liefhebber, Martin ; Northrup, Beth ; Straw ; Terrett, Grace
  • Is Part Of: Toronto life, 2004-10, Vol.34 (10), p.110
  • Description: Liefhebber warned the women that the design process was traumatic, having himself watched a few marriages collapse. Here, there was no marriage to fracture, but these three women, who had never lived together, and who had different aesthetics and health considerations, faced hundreds of decisions. In essence, they wanted five houses: a separate 1,000-square-foot suite for each owner; a 2,000-square-foot common space with kitchen, living room, library and dining room; and a guest suite in the basement. It was Terrett who came up with the house's configuration--the common area on the first floor, with Northrup's one-storey suite above it, and Terrett's and Bradbee's two-storey suites on either side. Liefhebber made models and faxed blueprints to Bradbee; she would then white out the parts she didn't like, draw in alternatives and fax the plans back. Trying to establish what materials Northrup could tolerate, Liefhebber and Northrup would wrap samples of wood or tile in foil, leave them on a windowsill to "cure," then note if she developed headache, fatigue or difficulty breathing. The straw bales ("like wrapping a down jacket around the house," in Bradbee's words) symbolize much that Liefhebber and his clients hold dear. They're inert and non-toxic. Beyond that, they're cheap (a 30- by 18- by 18-inch bale costs $1), low-tech and what Bradbee calls "empowering." Translated, that means they're light enough for women, children and grandparents to stack. Over two weekends, they did just that, then sewed them with binder twine to an enveloping skin of chicken wire. For Bradbee, planning her straw-bale house was literally life-altering. Philosophically, she loved the communal process of the evolving design. "It was a real challenge to the architectural culture of the master builder," she says. "The owners, tradespeople and Martin designed all the way through--it was like a third-year design studio for me." The logical follow-through was to enroll in U of T's architecture faculty in 2000. She designed the house's garden, with native grasses and stone walls that provide year-round interest, and she now works as a landscape design consultant. As Liefhebber likes to say of mutually advantageous relationships, "It's a loop!"
  • Publisher: Toronto: St. Joseph Communications
  • Language: English
  • Identifier: ISSN: 0049-4194
  • Source: ProQuest Central
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