iN VIDEO: Check out this amazing, unique Penticton home made of recycled timber
Penticton architect and builder Geoff Orr has built a pretty special house in the hills east of the city.
The structure was built almost entirely of recycled lumber and contains building materials from a former Penticton grocery store that were repurposed to build the unique home in the hills above Penticton.
The story is captured in a YouTube video entitled “Man Builds Dream House From Recycled Timber.”
The video was released on Jan. 10 and has already been seen more than half a million times.
Orr describes how he decided to build the house and hone his skills upon graduation from architectural school.
Located in a burned off area in the hills east of Penticton, Orr lived in a tent and a tool shed while experimenting with designs before building the house.
One of the building’s features is the use of recycled materials throughout, including massive glue laminated beams that were salvaged from Penticton’s old Super Valu grocery store on Martin Street. The building was condemned and torn down in 2006.
“These are old, old beams. The are, like 70 years old, so they aren’t gaining or losing moisture anymore. They’re old fir, and fir gets like steel when it’s that age. They aren’t going to split, crack or create problems,” Orr says in the video.
Orr’s house, 5,600 square feet in size, took 14 years to build. There’s an additional 700 square feet of roof due to overhangs, the windows are cut into the building without framing, and a grotto cut into a nearby natural rock formation adds to the uniqueness of the building.
Orr even shares some of the philosophy that he used to create this one-of-a-kind living space.
“You gotta make decisions and move forward, or nothing’s going to get done. You can spend half your time just thinking about what you’re doing, but the reality is if you had just started in a direction... you know you’re going to adjust and make changes along the way, and learn a whole bunch more just going through it,” he says.
“Just thinking about it and dwelling on it, you’re just wasting time, you’re not actually getting anything done,” Orr says.
The home has also been featured in Western Living magazine.
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