From timber frame to finish in 7 months

We arrived in Sibiel unannounced. We were on our way to Cluj, to nZEB Week, after another shooting in Cisnădioara. We decided to stop off in Sibiel, at the house Andrei is building, to see what stage the work is at. However, we arrived too late in Cluj to film anything else that day.

Andrei and Smaranda we met 7 months ago when they told us how they found a nice place in Sibiel and build a wooden house in the middle of the orchard. At that time, the wooden structure's skeleton was erected and the installation of insulation on the roof and the entire exterior of the house was begun.

Now, I had spoken to Andrei on the phone a week ago. We knew he was very busy working at the Waldkinder kindergarten in Sibiel and we didn't think we would find him on site. That's why we had decided to talk to Nicu, from the team of craftsmen, to see the status of the work and find out from him how much longer it would take.

We were surprised to find the house almost finished both outside and inside. On our last visit Andrei told me his plans, but I didn't seem very optimistic that he would be able to stick to them. As usual in such cases, we depend on budgets and Andrei was looking for solutions.

Now, from the outside, as I told you the house looked almost ready, and Andrei was also present. On his way out, admittedly, but he made time for us too, to tell us what had happened since our last visit and when he thinks they will move into their new home.

I'll let you discover for yourself in the video his impressions at this stage of the work. Something else I want to highlight. It's something that you may not understand exactly from the video, but it surprised me. It surprised me because this doesn't happen to me often. Without asking his opinion about the team he worked with - the one led by Nicu - Andrei felt the need to talk about this. He also seemed somewhat surprised that he had found a team that, throughout the construction phases, had done more than they had promised, at a steady pace, and always respecting the self-imposed quality level.

I wanted to highlight the above story because it shows me, once again, that it can be done. Quality materials, know-how (sorry, but it sounds best in English, this one about respecting technologies might be in Romanian but it doesn't tell the whole story), Șoflete and others like him (here we include ourselves 🙂 ), all this makes people (and here I mean both builders and beneficiaries) build faster, healthier (both for them and for everyone else) and better. It can be done!