Construction Photos of Villa Lagoon

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The 600 sq.ft. Studio/Guesthouse is along the East property line. The porch faces West.	The new Phase II residence ids to be situated lengthwise along the West property line. The garage will face the road (North) and the entrance will face the existing structure (East).
On waterfront homes, it is necessary to refer to the different sides of a home by the north-south coordinates rather than using terms like front, back, side, etc...The side of the house that faces the water is always referred to as the "front", thus making the side facing the street ...the "back". This is the opposite of what inland people expect and has caused great confusion over time. One large vacation home on Canal Road in nearby Orange Beach was halfway built before the Cincinnati architect visited and discovered that the house was on the lot backwards. In order to reverse the situation, special concrete drillers had to come to drill thru an 8 inch slab to re-do the plumbing in order to relocate all the bathrooms. So for that reason, I avoid calling anything the front or back of the house.. You can view the actual site-plan here.

This lot is aprox. one acre. It is 100 ft across and about 400 ft long. This location has an added advantage of a deep county owned easement, dense with live oaks. The old privacy hedge between this lot and the property to the west was destroyed by Hurricane Ivan. New plantings of native plants and tall bamboo are in now and growing rapidly in this warm climate.
The DAC-ART blocks are arriving and will be stacked over much of the property. Our workers have been as careful as possible to avoid any unnecessary killing of the thick St. Augustine grass. Much of it will have to be replaced in the end, but to avoid dust and mud, we are being as gentle as we can now.	A rented Lull type of lifting machine was used to unload all 12 truckloads of blocks. Built in handles make the lifting process pretty straightforward.
The hollow blocks have an inner liner of foam. The finished surface of the DAC-ART block forms the exterior and the interior walls. No cladding is necessary. The hollow core will contain rebar and back-fill concrete once they are stacked and leveled.	In order to conserve ground space and avoid killing grass and crowding our workplace, Mike has carefully stacked the long blocks. He put pallets underneath to keep the edges of the blocks free of mud and dead vegetation.
	Our dry stack blocks come with both open ends for aligning against one another and with solid ends to be sued as columns and where openings like doors and windows go.
I have requested that all smoking workmen use the belt-clip ashtrays during the work day. The men were very good natured about it during the first phase of construction, and the result is a much cleaner job site. Feel free to call or email me for details on how I made these inexpensive personal ashtrays.

Villa Lagoon Gulf Shores, Alabama

Construction Photos of Villa Lagoon

Villa Lagoon
Gulf Shores, Alabama