The house was built in 2019 by somebody else and is, structurally, entirely adequate. The interior was specified from catalogues and has not survived six winters of being eighteen miles from a shop.
We were asked to redo it. We were not asked to redo it in a way that would need redoing.
Following the rock
The house steps down its site in three half-levels, which the original interior treated as an inconvenience — the same floor finish carried across all three, with the level changes absorbed by three sets of unrelated steps and one ramp nobody uses.
The new section takes the steps as the organising idea instead. Each half-level gets its own floor: flagstone at the entrance where boots arrive, timber in the middle where people sit, and flagstone again at the lowest level, which opens onto the rock. The changes in level are now announced by a change of material, so you feel the section through your feet before you understand it with your eyes.
Specified for the place, not the picture
Every material in this interior was chosen against one question: what will this look like after six winters here, with a wood stove running eight months of the year and salt in the air?
Flagstone gets darker and better. Unfinished Douglas fir greys and can be left. Brass tarnishes and can be polished by anybody with a cloth, or not. None of these needs a specialist, a service contract, or a product that may not be manufactured in a decade.
Current status
Joinery is being installed. First fix is complete. The drawings on this page are the current construction set and will be replaced with the record set at completion — not with photographs taken the week the scaffolding comes down.