Dyg HQ - Our Home and Office

For anyone who wonders where dyg originates, here are some images of our home and office.

The house is a low energy house, which means it requires little or no heating. Although made of entirely ecological materials such as hemp, cellulose and wood pulp, the house is very well sealed (when you want it to be, in the winter), and fresh air is circulated by a heat exchange. The walls are entirely breathable, which is unusual for this type of house, which makes it a wonderfully dry and healthy environment. Solar water heating and the heat exchange system are completely integrated into the house. The only source of heat in the house is a log-burning stove, complete with baking oven, which burns the same kiln-dried logs (Hotlogs) which we sell on our website. When you have a modern and efficient stove like this, you need firewood which has a very low moisture content. In time we will be able to supply our own logs, but until we have a two to three year drying process underway, we are delighted with our kiln-dried logs. Extremely well sealed and insulated windows, thick walls and correct orientation make this a very comfortable house in which to live and work.

Our builder was German Eco Homes (Breunig and Richter) - highly recommended if anyone wants to have a superbly made, comfortable low energy or passive home. Builders like these, who have many years of passive house construction, are setting the standard to which other builders can aspire. The architects were Fitzpatrick and Mays (Mays referring to Sam Mays, my brother) who have wonderfully interpretted the vernacular 'long house' of the Irish countryside in a modern way. (http://www.fitzpatrickmays.ie/)

Set in about one acre of quiet Wicklow countryside, we are surrounded by young native forest, and bounded on one side by a small stream. We had to fell a few Douglas fir trees when building the house and these are now our floorboards. The garden is something of a blank slate, having been almost entirely dug over to accomodate sewage treatment and percolation areas. The lower area, which is a wonderful damp meadow beside the stream, is blooming with Meadowsweet and Willowherb, and this will be kept just like that, cut down once a year with our Martindale grass slasher to stop the spread of brambles. The upper part, where there are some fine mature Douglas fir and oak, will be predominantly fruit such as apples, cherries and blueberries, along with a 'flower garden' around the house. We only mow paths and pockets through the longer grass. Because the soil is damp, we are building raised beds out of larch boards...... more to follow as the garden progresses.

North facade

Kitchen / lving room

A table in the office

South facade from upper level.