Lego for grown-ups

OK, so it´s all Randy´s fault who´s been pestering me asking for info on building with containers in Uruguay. I once happened to mention that my brother has a set up with two 40 footers for caretakers home and storage, laid out parallel to each other and with a detached roof covering both of them and generating a covered patio in between, which prompted Randy´s enquiry, and brought the subject up, where it has remained in the back of my mind for a couple of months already.

Now that we have empty land in Barra de Portezuelo (near Punta Negra) and Las Grutas (Punta Ballena), little money, and worst of all, NO ONGOING BUILDING PROJECT, when talking to a shipper this week I remembered to ask about the containers for Randy, and I seem to have opened a can of worms. It just so happened that this shipper was somehow connected to Multicontainer, the Uruguayan company that sells and customizes containers for other non-shipping uses.

The results of the initial enquiry were that a dry, non customized 40-footer costs USD2,600 plus delivery which all the way to Punta del Este is about USD500. Of course, this needs some sort of foundation, connection to utilities (water, sewage, electric), plus all the adaptation work and materials. Because they said that the prices for their finished products depend on the configuration, I have obtained an estimate for a standard 40-footer turned into a 2 bedroom dwelling, with a basic kitchenette (no appliances, this is Uruguay) and bathroom with no water heater.

The design, materials and finishes are pretty horrible if you are design-conscious, and very correct if all you need is inexpensive shelter. With vinyl walls and ceilings, awful kitchen and bathroom fixtures, small ugly windows and doors, and the most insteresting I think, the original wooden floors of the container refinished (more on this later), the price quoted, tax included with delivery and placement on the spot with a crane comes out to about USD12k.

These are pictures from the other company making the containers, Frimaral, but they are indicative of the depressing design that seems to rule in Uruguay container homes... nothing like the www.fabprefab.com fare...

Up to yesterday I was wondering how much I´m able to blow this price to smithereens... I always fantasize about being able to be thrifty-cool, but it happens on few occasions, such as with our kitchen cabinetry, which is thrifty cool, mostly, except for the expensive granite countertop. But then Randy on the Southron forum mentioned this other company, Frimaral, and their website would suggest that a) they manufacture the actual containers, and b) they are able to do with them whatever you want, unlike the other company that told me that joining vertically stacked containers was a problem, and c) my guess is that based on their size and manufacturing capacity, their prices may be lower.

I was further encouraged by the pictures on the site showing openside containers, which come with those sexy looking industrial doors. I had been thinking "too bad, those doors are so cool but they´re located at the end of the container. But no, they can be installed on any side! That means great views potential and full safety/weather protection.


Amazing doors! Am in love....

So now the challenge is to come up with something thrifty cool to dump on the lot where the pool is, to contain a storage room (Barbi´s tool room!), a bathroom and a large room that can be extra guest quarters, or gym/spa area. No, I´m not building a yoga room.

A most important function will also be to serve as wind barrier for the pool lot, which is so windswept that I have referred to it as "the steppes." If we somehow create a barrier that can give trees and plants a chance to grow, then slowly we will be able to expand a green barrier. Another potential use to this is to serve as the support for solar panels to heat the pool eventually. They would face North, which is where they have to face (in the southern hemisphere) and i would not be messing with the actual house´s roof, or just plunking them on the ground, which I´m not too excited about.

The Setai is alive!

Well, I thought that after who knows how many years from the original noise, the whole project was dead. In fact, if I remember correctly, some investor(s) had pulled out. Maybe with things so bubbly now they decided to give it another go, or maybe they were dealing with licenses and such all along. Whatever. Welcome back Setai is what I say. All the more so if, like the WSJ says today,

"Between $110 million and $130 million will be spent on the development, with plans to build a luxury compound including a spa, 10 cabana hotel suites and 40 private houses on the La Juanita beach and in the nearby woods. About a mile up the road, the 300-acre Laguna Escondida project is planning a 70-room hotel and 240 housing lots."


On other matters, I have to say that after about 40 days of being in our new house, we feel soooo priviliged to be living where and how we're living. The house gets nicer by the day. The last pieces of furniture and missing curtains have arrived, we now have two couches, a nice LCD TV, DirecTV, a cleaning woman who comes three times a week which is as much as I can handle the interaction (plus pool and garden people), a lawn that is getting nicer every day, and expanding into the non-lawn areas quite fast, a sweet dog that makes a big fuss when we come back home, and friends who come and spend the weekend or a few days of their vacations with us.

Not being on vacation myself, it makes me feel luckier than if I were. I punctuate my work-day with walks on the beach or along country paths (watching cows graze, the dog chase the hares, it's too bucolic) or swimming at the beach or in the pool. And "my office", overlooking forest and sea, from where I stare out the windows and watch the falcons chased by the swallows, the ducks flying, or any other of the myriad National Geographic scenes that unfold on an hourly basis.

I credit ourselves for our conscious choice to make this happen, against blank stares or outright discouragement by many people, but I also credit the success of our business for allowing us to build this house, and last but definitely not least, our architects' genius in making this house the way it is. I know we made a million little choices along the way, but they were all informed by their gentle prodding, or simply us choosing from options produced by them that we had never imagined or contemplated. Also, some things I was just informed of, in a no-nonsense kind of way, as in "The living-room roof is now 1.5 meters lower. Anything higher is out of the question." Now I look at my ceiling and think, "how could we ever have lived with 5m high ceilings if 3.5 feels sooo high?" I remember one very funny exchange with Fabian where he emailed me a list of questions for us to decide on 10 issues, in the form of "multiple-choice quiz." I was really proud when he said I scored 9 out of 10.

I talk about this house as if it were a huge palace, but no, it's just very simple, comfortable and as big as I could afford when we made it (only 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms). Still, as simple as it is, it literally stops traffic. Every day we get people driving straight into our car park and getting out to take pictures. We go from proud to annoyed to proud to annoyed, but in the end it's good news I think.

Scary storm and potential good news

It looked like a horizontal twister or something, and when it started pounding us I have to confess I got a bit scared. In the end, no damage, and a good chance to test the windows for leaks. I doubt that it can get much worst than the amount of rain that fell yesterday, or the wind-strength (Uruguay´s classic horizontal rain).

First we had the big scary twisting cloud come through...

Then all hell broke loose...


The poor garden guys had to seek cover in our barbeque area for about half an hour before they returned to work... Rather than declare it a "rained out day" they went back at it for hours after the worst part of the storm, even though it was still raining on and off...

Then, sun again, and even a couple of rainbows to end the day on a good note.



Onto the good news. After a very eventful day (semi-stalking of my friend Tamara by a local who approached her at the otherwise empty beach early in the morning, and mentioned he had "seen"us yesterday in our pool, later befriending by Tamara of 3 other cute guys at the beach of which she approved, heavy traffic at the house between garden people, pool people, cleaning lady, etc.), while I was trying to nap after the storm to rest a bit from so much excitement, I heard Tamara, ever the friendly one, welcoming a female voice to the house. I got up, went down and was introduced to a lady (American residing in Punta for the past 30 years or so, former owner of a restaurant I used to love) who came to introduce herself as "your new neighbor" and to inform us she had purchased four lots including 2 hideous houses to be demolished and replaced with a house in the style of ours. This is like winning the lotto for us, as the two existing houses on the lower end of our block are quite an eyesore to us, and the empty lots around them always a question mark, instilling fear of further ugly construction...

Also, her and her Uruguayan husband were such nice people that it was great to know they´re our new neighbors, intending to live here year round, rather than having four small and ugly empty beach houses, having a single house with lots of landscaped land around it, and inhabited by cool people!

A further boost to my ego was her statement that they had always loved the area but had decided to go ahead with this project after they saw our house and the fact that we had almost one acre of land between the 3 plots. This is validation for all I had theorized but without any proof that my reasoning was right every time I went ahead and bought another plot. (Why do you need another plot? To raise the value of the land around me and ensure that other people are encouraged to build on more than one plot, keeping the density of the block low, preserving and improving the views with more greenery.)

Anyway, we have to wait and see what comes through in the end, but I have high hopes, as they even asked to contact our architect. Funny thing was that I was suggesting this same investment to other people until a couple of days ago, and someone I didn´t know went ahead and did it. Now I think I will try to buy more land on the block if it comes up for sale...

New Year´s Eve

Our traditional program: a rushed dinner at my Mom's with family and friends, then a sprint down to the harbor for the countdown, and dancing until the knees gave in. New Year's Day in a coma after way too much champagne...

Mirtha and Coco

Cousin Nacho, Barbi and pretty pregnant Rosina
Lots of women in sexy dresses everywhere...

A very mixed crowd with lots of children and a few grannies as well

My brother Rafael commands the dance floor, well, the street

The Mirthas, Mom and Aunt

The count-down