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00:01houses are more than shelter the second we walked through the threshold of the
00:09door we both looked up looked at each other this is it yeah this is the space
00:15we wanted to live in the light and we wanted to live in the landscape for us
00:23it was a way to sort of connect my roots and expose our children and continue
00:28that legacy from our parents we sort of fell in love with the place and each
00:36other at the same time this building it's a real landmark around here it's an
00:43unconventional house but it's pretty fun the fact is that houses are dreams they're
00:51an expression of who we are and what we believe in
01:04cornwall has its own identity and you really feel that when you're here it's a really special place
01:11and we're very lucky to live in this beautiful Georgian house you have a sea view out of practically every
01:19single room the light on the water changes throughout the day you're just drawn to the view
01:33my name is Bianca Fincham I live with my husband Nick and with my two children Benny and Maud and
01:39our dog
01:41basil Pembroke lodge is a classic Georgian house built in the 1790s the kids love this house it's
01:49very special to them Maudie was born here Benny's grown up here it's a real magical place for them
01:56this house has a very large entrance hall a large living room we have a kitchen playroom upstairs we have
02:05three bedrooms on the next floor we have a further two large bedrooms and then one bed
02:11guest house it used to be a double garage
02:21Bianca's from Cornwall when I and I just fell in love with the area when we moved in with no
02:28heating
02:29racks and mice in the kitchen yeah there was lots of tea towels in holes in the walls to stop
02:35the mice
02:38as you come into the driveway from behind the house the first thing you see is this gorgeous view and
02:44the
02:44seat conceived new limb here and they've just repainted it so it's bright white with the red top and then
02:54in
02:54the middle the crowning feature sent Michael's Mount which is the beautiful castle on our island the
03:01house would have been perfectly symmetrical but the last owner actually added an art studio to the side
03:09it has gorgeous Georgian windows they're so big and beautiful a historian actually come recently and
03:17and said to us it's so rare to see a Georgian house this close to the sea when you enter
03:25the house you
03:25come into a large hallway which doubles as a dining room for special occasions and that's the view when
03:34we first saw the view it had a real impact on us it was quite magical it was very much
03:39yeah really just
03:40you know took our breath away so lovely in the morning you can see the little fishing boats going
03:46out window seat is such a great position to sit and look out and it was such a wow factor
03:53when we came
03:54here we just couldn't get over that this could have been our house though we fell in love with it
03:58and we
03:58followed our heart when we bought the house all the windows and very very dark teak and we painted
04:05them all white which just lifted everything and we have these kind of cascading roses that makes
04:10everything look really beautiful and very English from the hallway to the right is the family kitchen
04:21and you're greeted by these very large windows we inherited this big skylight and there was some
04:28kind of big picture window actually it wasn't very in keeping with the house and it felt a bit kind
04:32of
04:3380s so we put these doors on to match the Georgia windows of the main house it's so nice to
04:40swing
04:40open these doors of an evening sit out there with a fire pit I see the kids sitting in front
04:45of it
04:45because it's been most of the time sitting in front of iPads so it's quite nice to think that
04:48they're beating their brain and that in another way this area is called West Penwith you've got the
05:05great outdoors you've got beaches beautiful walks I think people are quite down-to-earth here and it's
05:11nice to have the pace of Cornwall which is a little bit slower and a bit more relaxed it's really
05:16important
05:21for kids growing up by the sea I need to be near bodies of water now that sort of kind
05:30of passing
05:30on to our family as well the room before it was a kitchen was all wood paneled that quite orangey
05:39pine
05:40and the kitchen was at the back and we decided to move the kitchen into here as it's the lightest
05:45room it's the brightest room yeah and everyone loves the Cornish granite wall as well it's quite
05:50nice that we managed to keep this bit you know and just by painting it white makes it feel a
05:55bit more
05:56natural there was an artist here called Walter Langley who had rented the house on two separate occasions
06:03in the 1800s he was very inspired by the local people and the light that we have down in this
06:09part of West Cornwall Walter Langley painted his most famous artwork the sunny south from this position
06:17looking out and so on this floor we have Benny's bedroom it's got these big striped curtains that we
06:28made and it's got a lovely window seat the bedroom next door has the lovely views out to the bay
06:35you
06:35can see more of st. Michael's Mount and the rooms get much brighter and lighter the style of the bedroom
06:45is kind of English country house style but a clashing prints a bit of maximalism it all started
06:51with this botanical wallpaper bringing the outside in the sea and the colors of the grass and the plants
06:58and then the window frame we decided not to paint because that kind of looks more classic arts and
07:03crafts I think we want the house to feel really welcoming and you know homely and I think that
07:08kind of English country house style makes everything look so warm and inviting as you come up to the
07:15attic bedrooms the views get bigger and you can see more of Cornwall I always feel at home here
07:28you know I feel instantly relaxed when I come in Benny is the pizza expert the kids are always so
07:37comfortable here as well I never really thought you could love a house as much as I love this house
07:47I'll divorce Nick before I have to sell this house
08:00it's the house that you know our kids call home it's where we come back to it's where everyone
08:06congregates and Cornwall how was a lot of memories for our family
08:14I think it's a magical place for the kids and I hope it's sort of creating childhood memories that
08:20are going to bring them back to Cornwall forever and keep them rooted in this area
08:47so we live in Nags Head North Carolina which is part of the Outer Banks which is a small skinny
08:53sandbar
08:54on the eastern eastern part of North Carolina our beach house is a two-bed one-and-a-half bath
09:06house
09:07it's about 940 square feet on the inside and then we have 340 square feet of covered deck I live
09:18here
09:18with my husband Louis and then we have two kids Felix and Reese and they are five and seven the
09:24family
09:24puppy Culper Felix breakfast on it's our full-time residence you know it's not a vacation house we
09:34spend our whole life here there is little pockets of the Outer Banks that we really really like to
09:39spend time in and this street was always one of them we kind of walked into a really good situation
09:45at the right time we bought a little 1960s house and it came with an empty lot and so that
09:52house was
09:53only 660 square feet it was before we had kids so we lived in that while we made plans to
09:58build this house
10:04all right come on
10:05oh it's looking good
10:12I know look at that
10:16my husband and I grew up here we left for college we came back because it's always been home
10:21it was a great childhood you know spending your days in the ocean as much as you can
10:27you gotta collect shells for a sculpture the build a life you don't need a vacation from yeah it was
10:32sort of our yeah like motto I love that my kids will get to experience what I experienced
10:41so it's the first time we ever built a house so we started just like sketching out little plans on
10:45graph paper and just drew yeah this like tiny little 1,000 square foot house
10:52we come right into a tiny tiny little entryway when you live in a small house you're trying to
11:01make use of every square inch we have the the built-in dining bench I would say like when we
11:09drew
11:09those first couple house plans out on the graph paper it was pretty much like how can we make this
11:15house really smart so like doing the Eden dine-in bench backing up to the kitchen you're kind of
11:21taking one piece of furniture and giving it like two purposes so then you walk right into the living room
11:32I take a lot of pictures like one of the nicest days at the end of the summer last year
11:38the kids
11:38are going back to school and we took them out for a day because the beach was just like perfect
11:45beautiful water surfed all day
11:52well the hallway basically goes to everything else that's in the house
11:58our bedroom I wanted like cozy warm bedroom so I built these last year more of like a hack
12:06but I just got these like Rubbermaid closet systems and then kind of built out and added trim
12:12and built them in it's such a small bedroom having a mirror in here does kind of help gives it
12:18more
12:18depth I made the frame it was kind of just like a picture frame and then I traced a an
12:24edge on it
12:25and then with the jigsaw just gonna cut it out I do have some squiggles throughout the house I like
12:34rounded edges and then this is the kids playroom art room whatever they need it to be I'm gonna try
12:46to put it right here yeah then I added in the squiggles for fun because it is a kids room
12:53and
12:54the first round the colors were just a little bit off in a couple places but then we did some
12:59color
12:59correcting and the kids came in one day after school and they were just like we love it oh my
13:04gosh so then I had to keep it they're really good about being into whatever project I'm into and
13:10being like we love it my friend Miles and me Reese were having a play date Miles built this this
13:16is the
13:22kids bunk room we built the bunk beds it was a big project I think with small spaces you have
13:28to
13:29get creative I'll throw out a fun idea and then he'll kind of like puzzle out the in-between and
13:35then we'll work together as far as like the actual building of it goes I taped three paint brushes
13:41together and then just like scribbled on the kids wall and then that ended up being like one
13:45of my favorite things in one of the rooms paints paint you can always paint over it so I try
13:52a lot of
13:53different things kind of like picking one room at a time and what can we do in this space that
13:59would
13:59be fun and give character to it I think a lot of the paint colors have a similar tone to
14:08them and I
14:08think that helps you know they're not ones dusty muted and ones super bright in your face I think
14:13they all kind of are cohesive in that manner and then this leads us out to the porch oh you're
14:25a
14:25good boy when we drew those first couple house plans we were like we want a porch you know we
14:30love
14:30being outside we wanted to be able to have a covered porch on the porch we have about 340 square
14:35feet
14:35which is crazy that's basically a third of the house the outside shower I would say we probably
14:49use it six to eight times every day in the summer one of the benefits of a house at the
14:54beach being
14:54on stilts is that it gives you this like bonus layer downstairs so this was a storage room that was
15:03just studs and foundation it's like half workout for Lewis and I and then half play area for the
15:09kids we're water people we've always just done what we can to make a life here I mean it does
15:26look kind
15:26of fun though right you know our summer days are built out of packing up and going to the beach
15:32for
15:32you know for six hours and we go to work at night so Lewis and I own a restaurant and
15:37it's a pizza
15:38restaurant and I said pizza we are only open at night and that is solely so that we can go
15:43to
15:43the beach during the day as a family the salty ocean air smell is like quintessentially home to me they
15:56get
15:57live at the beach in this house they get to be outside they get to do the childhood things that
16:02I think a lot of us want for kids honestly that's one of the biggest reasons like why I wanted
16:08to stay
16:09here and have a family and have the boys see where the sun's setting it's getting even more bright
16:15orange it's really exciting to see them have that opportunity look at the birds out there you could
16:23probably walk out to them it can't get any better some people have beach cottages just their vacation
16:39home but we benefit double because we live in our beach cottage it just feels a little bit wilder
16:49than a lot of the Bay Area that feeling of peace is always at home with us I love hiking
17:01here so
17:02finding a place where I could you know walk out of the front door and be on the trails in
17:0710 minutes
17:08was so important this is our Montero beach cottage it's about 1200 square feet we're on a 50 foot by
17:22100
17:22foot lot and our home is two bedrooms one and a half bathrooms to get here from San Francisco you're
17:32kind
17:32of like winding down the coast you're on the cliffs you feel like you're in a totally different place
17:40there's just a whole system of interconnecting trails here you can jump down to the beach or you can go
17:46all
17:46the way up to the top of Montero mountain I'm an architect doing like civic buildings and large
17:58multi-family housing projects this is the first residential project I ever worked on when we first
18:04saw the lot it had a couple bushy trees on it I definitely felt like I was the client and
18:11most
18:12which I benefited from like there were so many decisions that if I didn't care he could pick
18:19something which was really helpful when we started the design I really always wanted to put wood siding on
18:26the outside we were really after that natural wood look II pay it's a Brazilian hardwood that people
18:33often use for their decks it performs better than almost all wood in the face of fire it's also something
18:40that I think should be used ethically and this is a really special part about the EPA is it ages
18:47over time
18:59so this is the main living space and it's open concept got the kitchen the dining room the living
19:07room it's pretty compact my brother made these light fixtures these three above the island and then the
19:17the living space he and I collaborated on the sort of like design of the pottery in the morning the
19:28sun
19:28comes through like right behind here because it's East a little bit Southeast facing you can read here and
19:35then Naomi will come and snuggle to about a third of the way into the project
20:04we came down here and went for a walk in the woods and I proposed to Donia we got married
20:09during the process of
20:11construction and we had a kid so we were racing to the finish line to try to get the house
20:19done before our
20:20daughter Naomi was born I would like come to the construction site and like show my belly and try to
20:27like get the
20:27construction workers to hurry things along but yeah we were able to bring her home from the hospital to
20:34this house we got it in time this was like most sketch of our house from I think before we
20:53even
20:53applied for building permit I mean I just felt scary to take the leap of building a house I think
21:01when we came to the site and they had framed the house it was like oh my gosh you can
21:06walk around in
21:07it it really feels like a home and then that felt so exciting and we were like okay this is
21:12great this is
21:12all worth it so this is our room it's small it's simple but it's a really kind of special and
21:21relaxing
21:22place when we were doing the floor plans for the house we were thinking about how to make the house
21:27as compact as possible and I remember like putting a queen bed into the drawing of our bedroom and like
21:33room for a closet and we're like done like it doesn't need to be any bigger than that I think
21:38small homes just
21:40really work for some people and it doesn't have to be where you live on your way to something bigger
21:45that can just be where you live and be wonderful
21:55so this is Naomi's room it's actually one of my favorite rooms in the house because when your kid is
22:02young you spend so much time in their room rocking them to sleep or like up at night with them
22:07and you
22:08want it to be like a really peaceful and home space oh you're gonna do pretend sleep
22:31you know even though we're in the cold part of California we like to throw these doors open
22:55you know you know Naomi's not ready for it yet but when she's a little bit older I would feel
23:03totally fine
23:04and sending her out on these trails by herself because she knows them so well
23:11I mean I picture her just having this really outdoor childhood but I hope that she really appreciates the landscape
23:22here
23:22you know I didn't grow up by the ocean and I never imagined that I would live by the ocean
23:28and it's wild to me to think that this is just gonna be her normal
23:35just I think I hope that the place instills like a deep peace inside of her
23:42I think it'll be good for her to grow up in a place like this
23:46you
23:48you
23:52you
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