You heard right. The whole thing from landscape timbers, except the roof, flooring and one bedroom interior wall. It is located in San Jacinto County Texas, not far from where I will build. I wouldn't go that route myself, but it is testament to ingenuity and hard work that paid off well.
The couple who own and built it did it all themselves, and were gracious enough to give me a lengthy tour of it last week, including seeing 100s of pictures of the construction process. They were very proud of their effort and answered every question I asked, which was a lot. I'll have some pictures next time I go down there, which will be in Feb, which is when I will make the move from W. Texas.
It is absolutely beautiful. The lady of the house built the forms for the pier & beams, then poured them, using 318 sacks of sackcrete. She even did the wire tying on the rebar in the forms. The husband told me she did about 50% of the total construction effort while he was working down in S. America.
3 bdedrooms, with full kitchen, and loft, with a spacious living area, but the loft was added on later, and the roof is really too low for it to be usable for much more than a grandkids play area and storage.
They used many of the tricks I've read about here, including the wiring runs, and it is butt & pass construction through out. No notches-no dovetails-no tongue or groove interfaces. I guess it might be called butt and butt, since the 'pass' timbers don't go past the timber they intersect with on the corners, but they did alternate on each layer. Long spikes instead of rebar.
The interior is polyurethaned on each wall and the exterior left as it came off the truck. Over 3000 timbers in the house. They said it hasn't settled a fraction of an inch in the 3 years since completion. They did a heck of a job, and it truely is beautiful.
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