Marcus and Sholto The House That £100k Built

We're in the midst of a low-cost, self-build revolution.

Wow, it's massive.

It's harder than ever to get onto the housing ladder, so a few

brave, ordinary people are resorting to the seemingly impossible...

Oh, look at that.

..building their own home from scratch for less than £100,000.

-We keep being told, like, that's not going to be enough money.

-Mm-hmm.

But that's all the money we can find.

'I'm Kieran Long,'

and with architect Piers Taylor, we're coming to the aid

of six families attempting this toughest of challenges.

Yesterday was probably the worst weather we've had.

We can't afford to stop.

'We'll try to help them with design dilemmas...'

It could be really harsh and cold if you're not careful.

..challenge them to think bigger...

I've not seen anything like this before.

..and search out innovative solutions that make

the most of their meagre budgets.

Oh, look at that.

We'll all be pushed to the limit...

-We are in a bad situation, for sure.

-Yeah, yeah.

..as we attempt to turn these ordinary self-builds

into outstanding homes.

It's really important that we all realise what we're building.

This time, Marcus and Sholto attempt to build

an enormous home in the wilds of Scotland.

I think that's only the first load.

With a budget already pushed to the limit, will they welcome new ideas?

How do you feel about opening up the ceiling?

Can they agree?

Are you saying that I want to do this and I want to do that?

And will brave ideas backfire?

That's bowing in the middle, there.

-I wouldn't poke it.

-No, no, no.

Marcus and Sholto have been a couple for over a decade.

It was while on holiday from their home in the South of England,

that they decided the Scottish Morayshire countryside

was where they wanted to spend the rest of their lives.

What we love about this area is it's beautiful,

and taking our dog for a walk,

you look around and you can just stare at

what we're actually living in.

It's absolutely amazing.

-HE WHISTLES

-Bramble!

But having searched for a home with generous spaces for entertaining,

they couldn't find anything on the market that fitted the bill.

We're not a traditional family.

We don't need the typical

three-bedroom detached house with bathrooms galore.

We need something that suits us,

that friends and family are comfortable to come and visit.

So they've decided to build the dream home

they promised themselves while going through difficult times.

I found out that I'd got end-stage renal failure, and I said to Sholto

at the time, "Run for the hills." Because, you know, we'd not been

together all that long and we knew what the outcome was going to be.

It was going to be dialysis, erm, maybe transplant in the future.

Erm, but, no, you didn't, did you? You said, "No, I'll stick with you."

2006, I had a kidney and a pancreas transplant.

It just gave me a whole new lease of life.

To have that chance, to actually lead a normal life,

and also give you the gumption,

and the attitude and the confidence to try new things.

Using the proceeds from the sale of their home in Sussex,

they've bought a £90,000 plot of land.

It's in a rural location 45 miles from Inverness.

Here, they're planning a total change of lifestyle.

We're still young enough to... to work,

but the idea was to get more of a work-life balance.

The aim is to be mortgage-free.

The sale of their home, plus savings, has given them

a budget of 100K for the build, plus a 15K contingency.

We've got enough money to, hopefully, build the house.

Sholto is going to project-manage the house

and be as hands-on with the build as he can be,

so hopefully, that's going to save us a hell of a lot of money.

They've already spent £12,000 on the groundworks.

They hope the single-storey house they're building on top

will perfectly suit their needs.

Our main reason for having a bungalow is for the dog.

As she gets older, we didn't want her to have stairs to cope with.

-Or me.

-Or him.

To keep costs down, Marcus and Sholto have chosen an off-the-peg,

timber frame, kit house.

The front facade has a gable-ended double garage,

and an ornate porch leading to an octagonal hallway.

Access to the main living area is through double doors.

The open-plan room has standard ceiling heights and finishes,

and will act as the living, dining and kitchen area.

Access to the four bedrooms

and the bathrooms is back through the hallway.

It's a big and ambitious house, but I currently

fail to see the touches that make it distinctly one for them.

The whole kit is costing £54,000, and is starting to arrive on-site...

Hiya, do you want to start bringing it up the hill now, please?

Sholto has never built a house before.

My God, just look at this.

Yup, that's, that's quite a lot of house there.

Bloody hell.

Erm...yeah, that's...

God, that's quite a lot there, isn't it?

Didn't expect that. I think... I think that's only the first load.

They've invested in a high-quality kit which is almost a job lot.

It includes the frame and many other parts,

which should make budgeting the build far easier.

This is everything I've saved - well, myself and Marcus have saved -

and earned, and worked for, and... for the last 11 or so years.

This is probably about, oh, just under a quarter of all that,

now sitting on the back of a lorry.

But having selected a design that would perfectly suit

a typical family...

'..they're in danger of ending up with a home that doesn't suit them.

'Piers needs to interrogate the design.'

It's like a big bit of Ikea furniture, isn't it?

Yes, cos it comes with a big Allen key to put it all together.

All right, Piers, good to see you.

For Marcus and Sholto,

this is what they call their, kind of, forever home.

There's a lot riding on this emotionally,

and they want it to be special, but do you think there's just

-too much house here for it to be special?

-I do.

It's a three-bathroom, four-bedroom house with a double garage.

It's vast. It's too complicated. It's trying too hard, you know?

So, you come into the little octagon that

looks like a sort of gazebo plonked into the middle of this.

Immediately, there's a couple of grand taking out those doors

-and walls and so on.

-But it's a pretty mean ceiling height.

-I think it says 2.4 here.

-Yeah.

-But you know, it seems pointless to

-build a building of this scale...

-Yes, absolutely.

-..and not have some generosity vertically.

-Absolutely.

Simplicity is the main thing.

Reduce the changes of materials,

reduce the complexity of the building,

take out some of these doors internally,

and make it a calmer building.

We need to get them to realise that

this could be a much better building,

and I think, if he is really ruthless and really clever,

this could be done for £100,000.

Sholto will do most of the work himself,

but he can't erect the frame without a joiner,

and already there's a risk of spiralling costs.

We pay him for an hourly rate, since he's not on a fixed price,

cos he didn't want to work on a fixed price.

He didn't even want to give us a quote.

He just wants to work on an hourly rate.

13, 14, 15, is the garage.

And with a house of this size,

materials not in the kit will be expensive...

Just missing a few drawings...

..but whatever the pressures, Sholto is fulfilling a lifelong dream.

Sholto has always wanted to build his own house.

I have sketchbooks full of houses, from when I was in my...

as a teenager. Architecture's always fascinated me.

Planning rules mean changing the exterior now

is both costly and time-consuming...

..but there are still areas where Piers may be able to steer them

away from a conventional home, towards something more contemporary.

Sholto's been immersed in the design process for months,

so Piers may have a battle on his hands.

It's a really good idea to use... to make a model,

and immediately I want to dive in and make changes.

Piers suggests they should rethink the number of bedrooms

and remove the hallway,

as both are reducing the generous open-plan space they could have.

This is potentially a really clear and simple, big barn-like space...

-Mm-hmm.

-..and you're compromising it, I think,

by putting these walls in that volume,

and I think, as a key move, that wall needs to come back to here.

Moving the wall back, I'm fine with -

it removes this hallway that we don't need.

To me, it would make more sense as well,

-because that living area would come out, wouldn't it?

-Yes.

-Yeah.

But his biggest alteration tackles that bog-standard ceiling...

I think it could be really amazing,

-to live with these trussed rafters running through there...

-Mm-hmm.

..and expose them. Nowadays, all buildings are so sanitised,

and you know, cleaned from all that interesting stuff,

so if you've got structure,

-why wouldn't you want to see it?

-Mm-hmm.

The roof, I'm sort of...

I can understand it...

But...?

Let's look at it.

-So, that's the space in there that you've got.

-Yeah.

-OK.

But you could have a space that was, you know, like that.

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

It's more airy.

My... OK, my question to you is, if you're resisting it, is -

is it a nicer space with that like that or not?

-It's a nicer space, I agree with you there, it's...

-OK, stop there.

So, why wouldn't you want to make that change?

-Yeah, I'm curious.

-Erm...

-Exposed trussed rafters would be so unusual

and so provocatively different -

really, really contemporary.

Piers' alterations could transform this home.

Removing the ceiling would have a cost attached, but will

greatly increase the sense of space in their open-plan living area.

It would prevent the interior they've chosen feeling

like a standard home, and instead would be dramatic and individual.

Removing the octagonal hallway and one of the bedrooms would maximise

the usable living space and reduce costs by saving on walls and doors.

I don't think you'd need to make a decision today.

-I think you need to reserve judgment...

-Hmm.

until you've gone to look at a couple of buildings

that have something similar.

Now, I think I need to leave you to just deliberate.

Yeah.

OK.

Yeah, pretty exciting stuff, though.

-Yeah, good.

-Mmm.

-Good.

As Head of Design and Architecture at the Victoria and Albert Museum,

I'm always trying to find

the most remarkable new buildings in the UK...

..and I'm taking Marcus and Sholto three hours across Scotland

to an amazing house, which I hope will show them

how good theirs could be...

-So, here we are...

-Wow.

This kind of beautiful, faceted black thing.

-OK.

-What do you make of that?

It's definitely striking in the landscape, isn't it?

It is, incredibly.

This highly individual home is the Black House

by Raw Architecture Workshop,

on the West Coast of Scotland, near Skye.'

A staircase takes you up to a breathtaking open-plan space.

-Wow, look at that. It's amazing.

-This is where you start to see

what it's all about, up here, don't you?

Yeah. It's astounding, isn't it?

The whole wall, the whole facade of this room,

-if you like, it just throws you out into the landscape.

-Yeah.

It's the non-standard unpredictability of this room

which makes it special.

When you're up here, you realise you're in this double-height space.

-Mm-hmm.

-And of course, that's given to you by the fact that

-it's a completely truss-free volume.

-Yeah.

Black House cost £310,000 to build.

A double-height space without trusses is way beyond

Marcus and Sholto's budget,

but Piers' idea of exposing the trusses would

help them create a similar sense of drama in their home.

It's beautiful. It just literally takes your breath away,

especially compounded with, you know, the views and everything.

Sholto already has a huge job ahead,

so he's in two minds about such a radical change of plan.

I do love it but I don't know whether

-loving something and living with something...

-No, sure.

But outside, he's quick to spot a trick with the cladding

that'll help him make his money go further.

Rather than one long length of timber for each strip,

the Black House repeatedly uses shorter ones,

elegantly butted together - so no wastage.

Each one of these, mitred at a 45 degree angle,

so when they meet, obviously,

the rain runs down, keeps a nice, tight line,

but you do get the horizontal lines in it, which, they sort of,

can take away from the blandness.

Both Marcus and Sholto like the sleek, pared-back

architecture and limited range of materials that lift

this house beyond anything mass-produced.

The simplicity is beautiful.

-I like the fact that you can't see the gutter.

-You like that crispness?

-I do.

-Two materials and glass.

-Yep.

-Openings are really simple.

There aren't loads of colours, and not loads of materials.

It's totally fitting for its surrounding.

The starkness and the awesome scenery behind it

-makes that work.

-Yeah, yeah.

I think Marcus and Sholto have taken a lot from this house.

They're really sophisticated about buildings.

They look at them in a really interested, attentive way.

I think this house has given them some serious thinking to do.

To actually see the vaulted ceilings, you know,

how simple it was, how it all came together...

and it gave me that enormous sense of space,

and given us an insight into what our house can look like.

It's too minimalist and white for me.

It's lovely, but, love it, can't live with it.

With Marcus in favour of the high ceiling

but Sholto unconvinced, there's a critical decision still to be made.

A choice either way will define their interior.

SAW SQUEAKS

It's November, and a month since the kit was delivered.

With the basic framework up, Sholto is now working hard on the cladding.

The challenge of building a huge house alone on a tight budget

has become his day job.

Working on your own, it can take you three times as long to do a job,

because you sometimes need two pairs of hands.

If I had a bottomless pot of money,

then I'd have a labourer,

but looking into how much a simple labourer now wants for a daily rate,

I think, hang on,

that's a hell of a lot of money to pay someone for labouring.

Morning.

Nearly three quarters of the budget has already gone on foundations,

the house kit and labour.

With only £28,000 left to complete the entire build,

Sholto knows he's got to penny-pinch every step of the way.

He budgeted £3,000 for cladding, but has cut the bill by £600,

thanks to the method he saw at the Black House.

Now every length of cladding is getting used,

thanks to mitring each joint.

The house is... The walls are 2.8.

Planks come in 4.8 or 3.2...

erm, so obviously, you're going to have cut-off,

and you don't want to waste it and just use full lengths of wood.

And as you can see, you've got the 45 degree angle,

for water to run down and it won't penetrate behind it.

He's also struggling to make do without the right tools...

We were trying to do it with a jigsaw.

The jigsaw was just not powerful enough,

so we've got to get a circular saw,

and renting a cordless one was an insane amount of money.

If I wanted to hire one for a week, I may as well have gone out

and bought one, so that's probably what I'll end up doing...

NAIL CLATTERS AND HE SIGHS

..hunt around for the cheapest one I can find.

By December, the weather's taken a turn for the worse,

and life on-site is getting tougher and tougher...

WATER TRICKLES

I think we need some guttering.

The problem with working with a nail gun...

that uses compressed gas...

is that though this is extremely powerful,

being an aerosol, it freezes, as well, and it...

..takes a bit of time for it to warm up again,

so you end up with one in your pocket

and one in the gun, and one in your other pocket.

It's not even firing.

By now, we should be inside

and plasterboarding,

and probably have a stove installed, which is what I wanted, so...

if you just work through...

Oh, dear, that was a naive thing to think -

that it was actually going to go to plan.

HE GRUNTS

Life isn't getting any easier.

There's still no electricity on-site

so the length of the day is seriously affecting progress.

At the moment, we're struggling with how many daylight hours.

Sunrise at the moment isn't till just before nine o'clock,

and then, the light starts going about three o'clock.

By about four o'clock, it's... virtually pitch-black.

Today's a rare chance for Marcus to see progress in daylight.

He's working full-time to support the build.

They've cut any day-to-day living costs to a minimum.

He's not as familiar with the build as Sholto...

-Is that lamb's wool?

-Lamb's wool? No.

LAUGHTER

-Is it cashmere?

-It's cashmere, yeah.

-Pure...

-Pure cashmere.

No, it's just glass. It's glass fibre.

They've engineered the roof trusses so they can be on show,

but there's no definitive decision on whether to leave them that way.

The pair have opted for Piers' other suggestions to make

the open-plan living space more dramatic.

They've had a rethink on the number of bedrooms

and removed the octagonal hallway.

We do like this space...

I mean, we always wanted a big space anyway.

We went from, originally, from four bedrooms

to two bedrooms, and this whole space, which we really like.

Although he likes it, Marcus is worried.

The way I see it at the moment, it could become quite impersonal -

it could be...not homely,

and I think that's one of the challenges we've got.

Sholto has a clear vision.

You have to think of it as a whole space

rather than breaking it down into... into bits.

I think what's going to work for it

is actually using large-format furniture,

so a kitchen that is made up of probably three large shapes.

I'm already working out the layout of the kitchen,

cos I'm going to want to make that all from scratch.

You're saying that, "I want to do this and I want to do that."

The way you work - the way Sholto works - is he's here all the time,

so he gets a feel for what's actually happening

and he's got a very creative mind-set, and it all gets stored up,

then eventually, it will filter down to me.

-No, cos it does.

-No, no, it does, no.

-And then, then we discuss...

I come to you with a solution rather than a suggestion.

You see? Cos I've already thought about it.

Yeah, which is exactly the point I've just made.

Right, so, yes, that's what normally happens.

It's an all-consuming build and money is running desperately short.

They've spent £86,000 so far.

Scheduling problems mean Sholto's been forced to get an alternative

roofer and electrician, costing £7,000 more than planned.

The build will soon go over budget.

Marcus and Sholto are really in the depths with their build now.

They're immersed in it, and perhaps at a moment where

it can be hard to get any perspective about design and what

they're actually trying to achieve with this project.

So I've brought them to a place that I hope

will kind of unlock that a bit, and inspire them again.

This is a building that has a volume inside

which is one large room,

which is broken down and made subtle, made homely, if you like,

in a variety of techniques,

so I'm looking forward to showing them.

Windmill Hill in Buckinghamshire

was completed by Stephen Marshall Architects in 2011.

It houses the archive of the Rothschild family.

It's not a home, but for Marcus and Sholto, it's full of design lessons.

So, it's a beautiful space...

Just one very simple, barn-like space. It's...

What do you...? What do you think?

Absolutely love it.

I think the most striking thing, of course, about this room,

is this extraordinary roof, this triangular, grid-shell

construction which is supporting itself, and allows it to be so open.

I mean, obviously, this is expensive,

but nonetheless, what I really like about it is how these triangles

form the whole, sort of, decorative order for the whole room.

I'm liking the motif that's used through the whole space.

Finding a simple motif and repeating it throughout the room

makes the large space work as one.

These tables are so beautiful, aren't they?

Serious chunky bits of joinery.

And these trusses, again, with that triangle motif.

Even though this is an archive room,

and the room does have a single function,

By looking at it, you also see, well, it's got a research area here,

but you've also got, sort of, comfortable chairs

if you actually want to sit and read.

Erm, so it does still have multi-functions in this room,

and that's dictated by the furniture.

The thickness of those shelves -

those are much more chunky than regular bookshelves -

is consistent with the desk, which is even consistent

with these big, kind of, triangular pieces in the glazing.

So, all of it is just one thing - gives it a tremendous coherence.

You know, I think, here, the effect is, to take what is quite

a big space, and sort of, somehow bring the scale down.

You see that these are these large triangles. Smaller ones

-in the roof, even smaller ones in the furniture...

-Mm-hmm.

..and gradually, the scale of this space

-is brought down to human scale.

-Yeah.

Which is, in a way, what you guys need too,

with your... your very large living space.

It's not intimidating, which it could have been.

I think, seeing this building today has really shown us how

an open-plan space should flow from one area to the other,

and how you can still have different areas with different functions

but you're not separating them by decor or materials.

Rather than compartmentalising things into little boxes

within a big box.

Our room's about that long.

I've been really excited about how Marcus and Sholto

-reacted to this building.

-Yeah, I'm...

Marcus, sometimes, in this process has felt a little bit left out.

In a way, I think it's kind of made him excited again

about the process. As a design process, it's inspired him,

and he's clearly gone away with really high aspirations.

Once you box it in like that...

Sholto has to find a way to achieve this within the level of resource

and skill that he has himself.

I mean, he is pretty on his own on this build, and I think that's

going to be a real challenge,

meeting Marcus' aspirations, and now heightened aspirations,

with what is still a very tight budget.

Back on-site and four months into the build,

Sholto has almost completed the mammoth cladding job.

Money's tighter than ever, so Marcus needs to keep heading out to work -

keeping him away from the site.

Piers needs to help them come to some joint decisions...

I did throw a bit of a... a bit of a wobble, a few weeks ago.

I was actually, rarely, on-site at the weekend,

and I just looked round the house and I said to Sholto,

"I don't really feel part of this." I did feel so detached

-from what's happening.

-What was it in particular?

-Everything.

The tendency, when building a house physically yourself,

-as Sholto is, is to put your head down and get on with it.

-Yeah.

I mean, you've got to be so focused on doing it.

I mean, I've done it, and I remember when I did it,

you know, my wife felt like a widow.

-And from your perspective, things need to happen.

-Yeah.

You need to be in, duh-duh-duh-duh,

-and you just need to build it.

-Uh-huh.

And the kind of complexity of unpicking those decisions that,

on your own, you can make quite simply, is sometimes just too much.

You know, so it's a really curious thing.

Financial strain hasn't helped.

The extra costs for the electrician and roofer,

plus the water heater, stove and other essentials

has taken the spend to £110,000.

They only have a meagre £5,000 contingency to finish everything.

Every penny over that will have to come from Marcus' earnings,

which are already stretched thin,

or from savings set aside for their future.

To make matters worse, they have mixed feelings about the porch

that came with the house, and for which they have planning permission.

HE SIGHS

I hate it. No, I don't hate it. LAUGHTER

I hate the amount of money it's cost to build, cos it took

a carpenter more than a day just to put the trusses up on that...

-Yeah.

-..whereas it took a day to do the whole of the rest of the house.

It took more work for them to tile it,

and all because we weren't allowed to simplify the design.

Sholto's come round to the idea of exposed trusses in the main space,

but now the strain on the budget

means he's backtracking with a further compromise.

Additional plastering and labour to help him complete

the full-height ceiling will be £1,200.

Desperate to eke out the £5,000 remaining in the contingency,

Sholto plans to reintroduce a conventional ceiling

over two thirds of the space.

Just the kitchen area will remain open to the rafters.

Marcus isn't convinced it's the right decision.

I do think the amount of time and money we've actually invested

to get to this stage,

it would make sense to actually go the whole hog with it.

Piers sees the double-height ceiling as critical to the house's success

You've got to hang onto the things that make your building

what it is, that make it architectural, at all costs,

and banish the things that are less important.

And for me, the most important thing in that house is that

sense of space, and then, the beauty of that structure, the quality

of light that comes in and gives it that incredible grandeur.

I think at this stage of a building, when money's tight,

and Sholto is just focused on doing his job, which is

finishing the building, you just do what's available

at a builder's merchants, and you go through the motion

of just making a house that has conventional things in it.

They really need not to do that.

-What we'd like to do is just focus on this bit here.

-OK.

Piers' strategy is to persuade Sholto to go for

the full-height ceiling and make savings elsewhere.

So what we want to do is see these trusses in this bit,

and then we're going to paint them white and the walls white.

So, no small ask, I realise that,

but I think it will be important to do.

Well, we'll see you in an hour and a half.

LAUGHTER

He asks the builders to plasterboard one corner

and the full-height ceiling,

so Sholto and Marcus can experience the finished effect.

The advantage of mocking something up is that you can really

make a judgment about something that you can't do

if you just talk about it, or even if you draw it.

Seeing it shown in front of you, full-size, full-scale, with the

actual light, the actual materials, the actual quality of space.

I mean, there's nothing like that.

Piers also has an idea for a low-cost design motif

that will unify the big space.

He suggests they make window reveals from chunky timber,

rather than plasterboard, to echo the roof trusses.

This, in a way, is probably more expensive

than just plastering into a window reveal,

-but actually, it transforms a building.

-Mmm.

-I like the way it frames the window.

-Yeah.

-And then it actually brings out the window more.

-It does.

And then, by its very design,

it's almost like seeing a picture through the actual window.

I absolutely love it, and I like the fact...

-I wouldn't have thought of doing that.

-Mmm.

-Although, I leave that to Sholto, anyway.

-Yeah, yeah.

Marcus is really positive about Piers' input,

but having worked so long and hard on the build,

Sholto is finding it harder to take...

No, I don't think Piers was actually criticising...

I think he was coming in with a fresh pair of eyes,

seeing this place for the first time,

but at the same time, you feel almost like

your legs have been kicked out from underneath,

and you've got to claw you way back up again, so...

It's deflating,

when someone does that to you, it can feel a bit deflating.

I can see that this testing of your conviction and decision-making

is pretty tricky for you, but in a way,

what I would hope it would do, at best, is make your design better.

You know, I mean, which bit of it has been most challenging,

-do you think?

-The whole...the whole questioning.

My... Not your questioning, my own questioning of my ideas,

and are they still valid?

It's good to be challenged, because it makes you think,

but when you haven't...

When you haven't been challenged, you almost get set in stone.

The single defining characteristic of this building,

if you follow through with this ceiling, this vaulted roof,

-this exposing of these trusses...

-Mm-hmm.

..will be extraordinarily dramatic.

As work on the mock-up continues,

Piers turns his attention to finding ways to save money

in the rest of the living space and get them to agree on layout.

I think we're looking at three primary functions within that space,

-erm, being - cooking, eating, living.

-Mm-hmm.

But then, we also want to go against convention a bit

and then within those spaces, like, for example, the kitchen area,

also an area where we can get together and relax.

Then, within the living area, you know, again,

there we can have, say, a dining table or something,

so they just all overlap.

The only fixed elements are a stove and a kitchen island.

The island could be a critical area for recouping some of the cost

of opening up the ceiling.

Sholto is interested in making it out of concrete to match the floor,

but nervous about the design and technique...

-Well, we've talked about it quite a bit, actually, haven't we?

-Yeah.

At one stage, we were thinking, we could do a concrete pour.

-Mm-hmm.

-Yeah.

-Erm...

Which we...but I think it might be, with the floor,

-I think it might be a bit...

-Concrete overkill.

-A bit too much.

-My prejudice would be that it would be concrete.

-Mm-hmm.

But, you know, because it's so cheap, it's so easy,

it's so beautiful, it's so versatile, it's so durable...

-My idea was a bit National Theatre, wasn't it?

-Mmm.

-The concrete texture on that, make a form for it...

-Mmm.

..pouring it and then using

the slightly dulled larch, with the concrete, actually,

-as another part of the kitchen.

-Yeah, beautiful.

I've seen that done. Really fantastic.

I feel...I feel, though, we should turn this way

and look at you, and ask you, ask you, Marcus,

your feelings about this.

I'm going to make... I'm going to make a bold statement now.

We are going to use a form made out of larch wood,

-we're going to pour the concrete in it...

-Amazing.

..and that's going to be it, because I love the sound of that.

A self-built concrete island could be very cheap to make,

while still giving the kitchen a custom-made feel,

but more than anything, it'll be the decision about

the full-height ceiling that will define this house.

It's time to see if Sholto is persuaded

it's worth the extra cost.

So this is now a finished bit of building,

-which I think looks pretty amazing.

-Wow, absolutely.

-It does.

I'm starting to notice detail that you hadn't even thought of before.

You know, the trusses are actually more defined

cos you've not got all the business end

of the different coloured woods, the OSB,

and everything else behind it.

Having now seen this, it makes me 100% aware that it is right to make

a sacrifice and get this completely open and finished, like this.

From this point back, all that would have been cut off from us.

-Yeah, yeah.

-You know...

The big win here is those east-facing roof lights that will

really animate that space, even when you're down this end.

The chunky window reveals get a thumbs up too.

You've led us in the right direction

and actually made us see our priorities.

Marcus, you told me earlier that you don't really feel or haven't

felt part of this interior, yet,

but coming up here in the daylight, and seeing a bit of this

building finished - how do you feel about it now?

To be perfectly honest, it just sort of takes your breath away.

With the joint decision made to spend the extra

on the full-height ceiling, a concrete kitchen island

is a good way to save a substantial amount of money,

but only if Sholto gets it just right...

I've invited Sholto to look at London's Southbank.

Though it definitely divides opinion,

it's an amazing testament to the creativity

that can be expressed in concrete.

The reason I want to bring Sholto here

is because it's a place that shows the full range

of possibilities of concrete.

Oh, and it is brave of you to tackle concrete.

It's not a material that's that popular in this country

with a lot of people. Do you...? What do you think about it?

I always want to do something once, and I don't mean that as in

-try it once, I mean actually do it once and that's it.

-Yeah.

That is...should be enough to last, and I think concrete is a material

that does last, and you can see that from the buildings here.

Concrete was chosen as the dominant material for these 1960s additions

to the Festival of Britain site.

It unifies the range of buildings

and reflects their urban surroundings.

It's amazing here - you're just totally surrounded by concrete,

but you start to see the care with which this is all cast and made,

don't you?

Three joiners' workshops on-site created the wooden formwork.

Much of the concrete was then poured in situ.

The patterns remain today...

Where it has weathered,

you can still see the texture that was originally there.

Yeah, it's very, very precise.

You start...like these... these planks, you know,

where these boards have been cast against.

They're precisely measured in proportion to the

depth of the beam, and I really love that care and attention.

I mean, in a way, when you see concrete looking like this,

it's really more about carpentry

-than it is about concrete.

-Oh, absolutely, it's, it's...

almost all down to the preparation work, here,

and the final action is the actual pour.

And then the revelations, and the finger-crossing,

-and praying that must go into taking off the form.

-Yeah.

The Southbank Centre's Hayward Gallery,

Queen Elizabeth Hall and Purcell Room are made of

27,000 cubic metres of concrete.

As well as concrete poured on-site, there are precast panels

made of Cornish aggregate with white cement.

This stuff is so nice, isn't it?

It's extremely rough, these precast panels.

It's almost like a kind of very rough pebble dash,

but it's got a beautiful texture, though,

and these little sparkly bits of mica

in these stones do pop out, don't they?

Look at this piece, though. I mean, this is a kind of...

a goalpost-type construction, pretty straightforward,

beautifully cast, and with an aggregate

with lots of... When you start to look closely at it,

it has lots of different colours,

and quite a lot of depth to it, doesn't it?

I mean, it's much more beautiful

-than you might think at first glance.

-Yeah.

And the way it's cast, with these

-lovely chamfered corners.

-Yeah, but...

When you're going in a doorway you don't want to

-knock yourself on a sharp corner.

-It's something I was concerned about,

having a kitchen island,

-is you do the same, you're going to walk past it.

-Yeah.

-So maybe a chamfered corner might be a solution to that.

-Yeah.

And what about these surfaces?

Cos when you see the inside here, where it hasn't been weathered,

it still has all of that quality of wood.

-It's so beautiful, isn't it, this?

-Absolutely. It's lovely.

This is the look that I want to go for.

We're going to be using the larch that we've used on the outside

of the house, and I want to use that as the exposed bits,

the bits you're actually going to see.

I want to use that to make the mould with.

This is very similar to, hopefully, how ours will turn out.

It's given me plenty of things to think about with what I want

the finished result to be,

but also, what I'm going to use to achieve it.

It's all got to be considered,

experimented, agreed upon

and then done.

Being concrete, once it's set, that's it.

The only way of getting it out is a sledgehammer and wheelbarrow,

so that does sort of fill me with a bit of dread.

Despite his trepidation,

Sholto presses ahead with formwork for the kitchen island.

As on the Southbank,

the idea is to let timber create textures in the concrete.

Today is his first ever concrete pour...

Erm, the most nervous day of the build, to tell you the truth.

This needs to be rolled out here. HAMMER THUMPS

It's all right, I'll do it.

Marcus is getting a rare opportunity to help.

As an observer in my own house, it's looking fantastic.

Any mistakes made today will be set in stone.

Piers has come to ensure there aren't any.

Hi, Sholto.

-Morning, Piers.

-You look like a man on a mission.

We're on a big mission today, yes, I'd say.

Brand-new concrete mixer, too.

-Yeah, cheaper to buy one than to rent.

-Yeah.

-And we can sell it on, so...

-Yeah, yeah.

-What mix are you using, in terms of ratio?

-Erm...

Three sand, one aggregate, one cement.

And any special aggregate or just bog-standard?

No, just bog-standard pea shingle, which we have a pile of left over

-from something else.

-Let's go and have a look.

Wow, look at these trusses.

Don't they look great? Hi, Marcus.

-Hi, Piers, how are you?

-Good, really well.

-Good to see you.

-You too.

-And looking good.

-I know.

This is amazing, isn't it?

So this is OSB formwork,

-but then, on the inside...

-Yeah.

..it looks like you've got larch boards.

-They're not larch, actually.

-They're not larch?

-No, erm,

because the texture of it was actually too smooth, so you

got no relief in it, so you didn't get a pattern, so this is just...

-Cheap softwood.

-Cheap softwood that was lying around on the site.

So this didn't cost you anything, you just had it here?

Nothing cost me anything in here apart from...

-The reinforcement.

-..the reinforcement.

With plasterboard in place and electrics well under way,

the cost of the build has now reached £120,000 -

£5K over the contingency.

-Bought...bought units.

-Yeah...

To keep the build going, Marcus and Sholto are having to

spend savings never intended for the house.

-Yeah, so that's for the hob.

-Yeah.

They're using leftover materials

and sourcing new ones very carefully.

The kitchen unit carcasses to go inside the island

cost just £16 each.

-So, you're going to make this, aren't you?

-Yeah.

-I'm really longing to see the concrete go in.

-Yeah.

I'm not.

I'm sort of dreading it but the first...

-Cos you only get one shot at it, don't you?

-Yes.

-Yes.

-Yeah.

I did have one of these go wrong, I have to tell you now.

Oh, well, thank you for that, Piers.

Don't want you to have to break the whole thing out.

The ratio of cement to sand to aggregate, and critically, water,

affect how easy the concrete is to work with, and its durability.

CEMENT MIXER WHIRS No, no more stones. No more.

-More sand, or more...?

-More sand.

Getting it wrong is disastrous.

The first mix is too dry.

There might need to be a bit less

-aggregate in that.

-Yeah, definitely.

-Yeah.

-More water?

-More water.

-A bit more?

-Yeah.

The second batch appears to be better.

You want to, just, you know...

-and it's that kind of amount.

-OK.

Without extra water, the aggregate won't sink

and it'll be hard to get a good finish on the top.

HAMMER THUMPS

The bubbles in this are the air rising to the top.

HAMMER THUMPS

It's really important to get those out,

otherwise you will get imperfections in the surface.

The worktops have been a good trial run,

but the island is far more ambitious...

..and a huge test for Sholto's home-made formwork.

It needs to hold over half a tonne of concrete.

Yeah, you can see looking along it,

that that's bowing in the middle there, and actually,

what could happen, of course, is that it could just give

and you'll end up with a sea of concrete on the floor,

and no island, so...

-Are you confident it's going to work?

-Yeah, I think,

cos, you know, we've assessed it as we've gone along

and to stop now, and let this go off...

-Are you surprised how much concrete has gone in? Bloody hell.

-WOOD SNAPS

Erm...

HE COUGHS

-It's the wood's split down the bottom.

-Oh, yeah.

-I would leave it, actually.

-Yeah.

-I wouldn't poke it.

-No, no, no...

The formwork is under huge pressure from the concrete -

and there's really no knowing if it'll hold.

Well, I can't wait to see it when the formwork is off

-and you've finished this.

-Nor can I. SHOLTO LAUGHS

With a lot more concrete to pour and then set,

Sholto will have to wait a few days before he'll know if it's worked.

Marcus and Sholto had a long search for a place

they could settle down in, and truly call home.

Eventually, they found a plot in the North of Scotland,

where Sholto could realise his dream of building his own house.

It's been eight months since the house kit arrived on-site

and Piers and I are back to see if Sholto's managed to

turn this home into something uniquely theirs.

-Hey, guys.

-Hi, guys.

-Good morning.

-How are you doing?

-Very well, thank you.

-Good to see you.

-Good to see you, Sholto.

-Good to see you too.

Sholto, how has it been?

Because this is a hell of a lot of house to do yourself.

A fun process.

That was a long pause before... before "fun".

Was it really fun?

There were days when I was on a scaffold

with snow coming across the roof,

trying to put up cladding,

and the wind was taking me and the cladding with it.

So, it's a blowy day, and I'm imagining you nailing every single

one of these bits of wood to this house.

-Yup, absolutely.

-Can we have a closer look? Cos I'm dying to see,

-and have a look at the cladding.

-Of course.

They had only a modest budget to complete such a large house

and were hit with several unexpected costs.

Sholto's strategy was always finding ingenious ways to make

the cash go further, wherever he could.

Where you were clever, of course,

is choosing a... where cladding your building,

that was something you could do yourself,

-You know?

-Absolutely, it saved, I...

Well, thousands. I thought I'd worked out my quantities pretty accurately.

I didn't realise how accurately, and...

-As I was doing... This was the final face.

-Yeah.

I did my final cut and then this was literally...

the only...the only bit of waste.

You should be a quantity surveyor.

That is amazing, because usually, you allow about 10% wastage.

I mean, sometimes, even up to 30%, and here you are with 0.05% wastage.

Well, you need to make it 0%,

-by finding something to do with this.

-Yes.

We'll find something. Good.

But how has the inside turned out?

Wow, this is amazing.

I mean, what an extraordinary space,

and totally unexpected from the outside.

They had the courage to veer away

from the conventions of a family home.

They scrapped bedrooms and the hallway,

and created one magnificent living space -

saving money on walls and doors in the process.

Overhead, they finally committed the time and money

to expose the trusses.

Daylight floods the stunning full-height ceiling that came

so close to being covered up.

-I was more or less on board anyway.

-Mmm, mmm.

I didn't need any convincing, as far as this piece was concerned.

I loved the light coming through...

-through the windows.

-Mmm, mmm...

It's a good start to the day, being bathed in sunlight.

-You've taken a standard house, pretty much...

-Uh-huh.

..and through a process of subtraction,

you've ended up with something that's completely non-standard.

-And it's like living in a loft space, isn't it?

-Yeah.

-Movable, completely movable.

-Yeah, and...and undefined.

I mean, the only thing that's fixed is that end.

The large space, which could have felt barn-like,

is made homely, thanks to clever design choices.

Furnishings indicate different functions for different areas,

but almost everything can be rearranged as needed.

In the kitchen, triangular shelves were made,

for almost nothing, from leftover scraps of timber

and cleverly repeat the shapes of the roof trusses...

and Sholto's window reveals also echo the timber above.

Having found plywood on special offer,

he came up with an even cheaper solution than chunky timber.

I just went and ordered...

£120 worth of the sheets, brought them back here,

ripped them down with a circular saw,

put a mitre on the corner,

and I think it's given it just something a bit different.

So, £120 to do all of these window reveals.

-In the whole house.

-That's amazing.

What you've done here is to take very simple, very ordinary things

and make them architectural, and that's really clever.

In another cost-saving design idea,

light fittings are given a stylish twist,

suspended from driftwood.

The kitchen island was perhaps the element that allowed Sholto

to truly express his creativity.

How does this result feel to you?

-The result?

-Yeah.

-End result, I'm happy with.

-Right.

Getting to here... LAUGHTER

Cos I actually left as this was bulging,

and threatening to fall apart and flood the floor.

You left, it didn't fall apart.

I was back here very early the next morning to check that

I wasn't coming into chaos. A couple of days later, we did a second pour.

The weight on top of that actually did push it back more,

so the back of it, as you can see,

you've got this slight overhang on it.

I mean, this thing feels amazingly permanent and durable.

I mean, this will be here for generations,

whereas, usually, in low-cost buildings,

you have things that are so flimsy,

and fall apart as soon as you've moved in. Not this.

The island is a bargain.

At a total cost of £131, it's around 85% cheaper than a mid-range

manufactured island - and Sholto's created something very personal.

I instantly liked it, because of what it was.

The way that you've made

-a kind of formwork with chamfered edges.

-Yeah, yeah.

-This thing is totally unique, it's totally yours...

-Mm-hmm.

..and it adds to that feeling of how robust

and warehouse-like this space is.

Next to the kitchen, there's a generous utility room

and elsewhere in the house, bedrooms and bathrooms are taking shape -

but there's still a lot to do.

Sholto has worked his fingers to the bone on this build,

and at times, found it hard to handle Piers' input -

so has it been worth it?

When you're building a house, you get yourself so immersed in it,

you actually don't step back, but in the end...

it's right to question. It's right to challenge design...

..and I think the experimentation that we've done has actually...

It's worked.

My delight here is that you've taken risks,

and in a way, you haven't quite known how they're going to turn out,

but actually, you've trusted that

you would be able to get to the right outcome

if you really persevered, and that's what you've done.

Marcus hasn't had an easy ride either -

sometimes feeling excluded from decision-making.

How does it feel to you to be finally in?

The fact that we did do it and we're still together,

I mean, we even, you know, upgraded our civil partnership to a marriage,

only, you know, three, four weeks ago.

-Congratulations.

-Thank you.

We ultimately wanted to upgrade our civil partnership to a marriage

before we moved into the house,

because we just wanted everything perfect.

This couple has weathered the Scottish winter

and some emotionally tough times,

but how did their budget fare in the end?

Our initial budget was £100,000.

We've brought the whole project in just under £130,000.

We did put a contingency in of £15,000.

The roof came in quite a bit more than the quote...

the initial quote we had. The chap just never turned up to do it.

Electrical work also cost more than expected,

and other unplanned expenses

included the changes to the ceiling height,

and the switch from concrete to wooden flooring.

Spending the extra money, I think we got a much more

interesting house, and it's exactly what we needed.

Marcus, tell me, was it hard, sort of, dealing with that overspend?

I mean, did it...? It must have involved sacrifices.

There was a standing joke at work, for example,

because, you know, for months,

I was going to work with my little lunchbox,

erm, with just salad, crackers and cheese in there, but what...

what people didn't realise was that's all we could afford to spend.

But doing things like that, we've had to sacrifice on lots of things.

But it is worth it, to know that we have our...

We own our house, which is... an immense, brilliant feeling.

And do you feel like this...I mean, this huge space you've created

is in the service of the way you want to live?

Yes, it's...I mean, it's exceeded all my expectations,

to be perfectly honest.

I think perhaps what's best about this project is not

that it's a piece of high architecture,

but it has quite modest and humble beginnings.

I mean, this is a kit house.

This is the sort of house that most people buy off the peg

and move into without questioning,

but with a few key moves here,

that have been quite simple in some ways,

Marcus and Sholto have transformed something that is

really quite ordinary into something that is really quite beautiful.

Is it a proud achievement?

I'm very proud of it cos I think it actually shows what you can do

if you're... if you're willing to take a risk.

I mean, that's it. I mean, we are two ordinary people.

There is nothing special about us at all.

And you always hear,

"Oh, if I can do it, then you can." But it's true.

I didn't think we would get through it, and there's...

at times, but if you've got the resolve, like Sholto said,

and you know, you go for it, you focus on it -

I think anybody can do it, to be perfectly honest.

I'm really amazed by the space that Marcus

and Sholto have been able to create here.

It's big and generous and beautiful. I really love it.

But in a way, this project is about so much more than that.

It began years ago now, when Marcus was really ill, and Sholto and he

decided together to build a house and have a very different life.

It's led and motivated Sholto to drive every single nail

into that house behind me, as a kind of monument to their relationship.

It's a really beautiful story,

and what they've created is not a cookie-cutter house,

it's a house that suits only them and is made for their lives.

Next time...

Andrew and Claire dream of building a modern farmhouse...

Oh, look at that.

40 minutes to this stage.

..but will they end up with a glorified mobile home...

It's really important that we all realise what we're building.

..and in financial ruin?

We've got over £10,000 of credit cards now.

It's something I feel very, very uncomfortable about.