Building on sand, you have to dig your foundations down to the hard stuff. Trouble is, the soft stuff keeps filling the holes in. So it's one scoop forward,... and a couple back. You'd be mad to do it by hand, especially if you're building two houses on the same sand dune at the same time. (SIGHS) Whatever your grand plans are, we'll help get you home. ANZ ` proud sponsors of Three's Grand Designs New Zealand. (ORNATE CLASSICAL MUSIC) Captions by John Gibbs Edited by James Brown Captions were made with the support of NZ On Air. www.able.co.nz Copyright Able 2018 (MUSIC FADES INTO TUI CALL) (BRIGHT ALT ROCK MUSIC) Zach Williams is a competitive mountain biker, a man not afraid of committing to a difficult or dangerous physical challenge. Work hard, go fast, get ahead. He's also a builder, and he's taken on a new challenge ` building a house here in Dunedin with Tess, a Tasmanian teacher he lured over from Australia three years ago with a promise of sea views and beachfront living. TESS: He convinced me that Dunedin was the place to be. I kind of made some big decisions in a small amount of time. I packed up my house and I got on the plane the next day. But the seaside town of Little Brighton is well south of Tess's hometown in Tasmania. And it's here, on a sandy site that looks more suitable for sandcastles than houses, that Zac will be taking on his biggest endurance test yet. So, how did you guys find this? We were renting just along the road. And the 'for sale' sign sat outside for quite a long time. We walked past it and decided that that could be us ` we could build something quite cool up here. Sounds great, but, I mean... we all know that, you know, beach sites are dealing with global warming,... Yeah. ...shifting sands. (LAUGHTER) Yes. And, that being the Southern Ocean, it would throw everything at you here, wouldn't it? It sure does, yep. Not unusual to see some sideways rain and the sand being picked up and chucked in your face. - All I can think of is, being a Wellingtonian, 'Mad, mad, mad.' - (BOTH LAUGH) We did think that. There was a couple of years ago when we watched the icebergs, kind of, float past. Mm. So, uh... They kind of tend to down here, don't they? Did you tell her that before? I haven't... He certainly did not. That's the first I'm hearing of it. So, tell me, what are your plans? What are you gonna build? We've got a 167m2 two-bedroom house designed for us ` open-plan living, with a mezzanine above the kitchen. Zac and Tess' house is a scaled-up bach designed around two connected pavilions set on thick concrete foundations dug deep into the sand. The smaller pavilion is a bedroom wing with a dressing room and en-suite. Sliding doors reveal a dining area that'll feel like it's on the beach, opening to the larger pavilion with an expansive high-stud living area, with stairs to the mezzanine bedroom and a living space on an inside deck where massive floor-to-celling windows maximise the breathtaking view. The glass is triple-glazed to keep out the sounds and cold of the roaring winter wind and crashing ocean. And a choice of three verandas means the wind will never stop Zach and Tess from getting outdoors. Clad in reverse-cut aluminium to give extra protection from salt and sand, the house sits on top of the sand dunes, the two pavilions an exciting modern take on the old Kiwi bach, or 'crib' as they say down south. How are you gonna do this? I mean, clearly you've both rolled your sleeves up. Well, not that you've got any. Yeah. (LAUGHS) Yeah, so I'll be building it part-time, as well as building another property along the road. What, two at the same time? Two at the same time. It's gonna be after hours. Ah, some very long nights. Weekends will be chock-a-block, and with Tess's help. As you head into winter in a high wind zone? Yes. Yes. And, what's your budget? Uh, it's coming in at around 275. 275!? Yes. How on earth are you gonna do that? Ah, well, labour's free. So we purely just have material costs. That's how we're doing it for the price we are. It's sounding pretty shaky as a proposition to me. I mean, it's a big ask. It is. It's a very big ask. What do you think, Tess? I think he's probably lucky that I don't know enough about building. Because if I did, I would probably be terrified. But, you know, he doesn't say he can do something if he can't. So I've got all the confidence in the world and just hope that it's well-placed. So, what about the time frame? This one will take us through till around October. We should be in and toasty warm by then. But, um, I don't like dates. You don't like dates? Yeah. What kind of dates? Yeah, well, a move-in date. Oh, you mean deadlines? Yeah, deadlines. Mm. (ALL LAUGH) Well, I wish you a lot of luck, cos you're gonna need it. Yeah, thank you. Yes we are, thank you. (LAUGHS) Zac's dislike of deadlines may cause problems here. But it may cause even more problems at the other house he's building just down the road. This one is the day job. It's a much bigger build. And to complicate things, there's a personal connection with his clients, Carol and Judd. Carol is his mum. It was always in the pipeline that we built a new house. And we couldn't have got anybody better than Zac to do it. But isn't it a bit mad that he's doing not just this for you, but also his place at the same time? He's young and adventurous. He'll do it. So you guys don't mind the fact that he's been working all weekend, and then he comes to your place, not very fresh? We'll feed him. - You'll feed him? - (ALL LAUGH) Biking might have to take a back seat this year. But, yeah, he knows how much it means to me. Oh, that's very special. Gosh, what a supportive mum. Oh, what a supportive boy. (LAUGHS) 'I'll build your house!' I see this relationship that Zac has with his mother, and I know that one would never let the other one down. Having lived on this double site for about 10 years, Carol and her partner, Judd, bowled the original houses to make space for their massive concrete and glass dream home. During construction, they will be glamping in a luxurious on-site garage, while Zac and Tess slum it in the rusty old garage across the driveway, with its outside toilet. I think they might struggle for the winter down there. Yep. But that'll make him work harder. The tips to good motherhood are` ...pressure. ...bring em' up tough. Too right. It's a case of having to. We can't both live in garages for the rest of our lives. Building two houses on sand through a South Island winter, with your mum and your girlfriend living in opposite garages? I can't wait to see how this one turns out. (AIRY CLASSICAL MUSIC) (SEAGULL CRIES) Luxurious as the garage may be, there's no time for sleeping in. Zac's got a digger booked down at his place today and needs to get that sorted before cracking into his mum's house. So, today's your first big day at your mum's house and then at ours. Yep. Cool. Looking forward to it. Yeah, when are you gonna ride your bike? The weekend. (LAUGHS) I think we might as well just put it in the attic and forget about it. All right. See you later. Bye, babe! See ya. And with Tess off to her teaching job at a local school, Zac loads his tools and makes the first of many journeys between the two sites. We did a bit of a blitz last night. Tess and I came down from about 5 o'clock through to about 9.30. We got all the profiles up, strung all the lines. Got the dazzle cans out and drew the house on the ground. Gotta love having a machine here. So much easier than a shovel and a barrow. Breaking ground means Zac's already breaking his rules and spending the morning on his own house rather than the day job at his mum's. We've just scraped all the vegetation and windblown sand off the site. And as you can see, we've got a really good building platform. Now we're gonna dig our first footing. The challenge we've got is with the sand drying out, the top of it was really, really fine, and having the problem of possibly caving in the footings. So a lot of cleaning out each morning, we may have in store for us. (AIRY CLASSICAL PIANO MUSIC) It's a weekday, so Zac's at war with the wind at his mum's site today. Here, he's already had a month of back-breaking digging and re-digging as his carefully hand-dug holes endlessly fill back in. A digger can take care of the surface sand, but the deep holes have to be dug by hand. We've used an excavator to get away the bulk of the sand. But these narrow trenches, the quickest way is just to hand-dig it till we get down to this good stuff, which offers a whole lot more resistance. It's sometimes really heartbreaking to have your trench clean, and you're about to retain it, and then the whole thing just drops in, so that's the rest of your afternoon, is gonna be digging out what you've just done. And this is just one of two sand-dune sites. So Zac faces this work at both houses. To go down the road and have a very, very similar problem is slightly trying at times, eh? Yeah, we've learnt some new words. The wind and sand in the eyes and the ears, you definitely know about it when you finish at night. On such a dry, windy day, Zac's only defence is the garden sprinkler. And after a full day at Mum's, as he heads down to work in his own sandpit, it must feel like he's trying to sweep back the tide. Having them both at that sand stage, and just digging through it day after day, just the caving in is just so demoralising, yeah. I've just never felt that much kinda disappointment in building before. (SOMBRE CLASSICAL MUSIC) With no end in site at Mum's place, the smaller footprint down at Zac's house means he finishes his own digging first. Tonight, he's putting in the boxing for the slab. He may be further ahead here, but he's behind where he wants to be. I think we're at least a month over what we anticipated. But he's not letting the delay compromise his attention to detail. Once we take these boards away, we'll have the imprint of the timber in the concrete. Which would be a cool wee feature. I think it's good; wee bit more labour-intensive. I'm amping for getting the slab down, just because as soon as our slab's down, from there, we're starting our build. Of course, Zac has two schedules to meet ` his house and his mother, Carol's, where he might be digging sand forever. Honestly, that's Carol's question a lot of the time. You know, 'What are you guys doing down there in that hole?' And so, um` Yeah, you've disappeared into it. You've disappeared. You guys have been down there for a long time, and we're not round it yet. The eight hours here is really good. I'm enjoying it. And every day it's problem solving. But I'm more than happy to walk away at 4.30 and go down the road. I really enjoy that. You look to your left, you see the end of your building, and you look to your right you see the end of the building. Here, if you look to your left, we can't see the end of it. We haven't even found the front of it yet. And one thing I can't see here is a finish line. With two houses to build and Zac's dislike of deadlines, I hope he's not digging himself into a hole. (AIRY CLASSICAL MUSIC) It's a big day here in Brighton. Zac's booked the concrete trucks to put down the slab for their seaside home. In any build, this is a milestone. Here, after months of digging by hand, it's a massive step forward. So, the weather will be OK for it? Yep. As long as it's not frosty. The long summer days are over. But Zac has set up a floodlight, to keep his late nights and early mornings focused on getting out of the ground. It's just this hole in the ground that we love dearly. So I can't wait to actually see some... some, um... ...some structure. Some structure. Zac is a stickler for details and perfection. And I can't understand why he loves to be as busy as he is. But it's how he operates. With months to go till his mum's slab is poured, but his own ready to go, Zac's spending a rare weekday morning on-site. Getting his slab right is critical to his build and budget, and there's already a delay. Had a bit of a holdup with the pump. So a couple of hours late, but that's OK. The frost has gone off. So it's probably actually improved our chances of a better finish. With his do-it-yourself budget, Zac will be watching the number of concrete trucks like a hawk. We've just worked our way out of the bedroom, and we're working our way through the dining room. They're getting a really good finish with it. Every dollar counts here. Zac will be hoping it's the last load. We've got one more truck on the street. The placers say it's gonna be close. Hopefully enough to see us through to the end and not have to order another truck. But like most things Zac does, the calculations are bang on. Happy, mate. We made it. Just enough concrete. It ended up being four trucks exactly. So it couldn't have gone better, really. Don't wanna make your head any bigger than it is, but that's the best boxing we've ever had. Is it? That's good, mate. (SOMBRE CLASSICAL MUSIC) By late May, it feels like winter's arrived. And with it, Zac's pre-built frames. But with Zac working the day job down at his mum's, they're just sitting here waiting. It's cold, wet and the build is behind schedule ` hardly surprising on a part-time build. Zac may have built the perfect boxing, but his perfectionism may be working against him. It's been a long time since I've seen a foundation that's been this well-prepared. Thing is, though, he's still on the ground. And I would've thought the frames would have been up, and possibly the roof even on by now. What's going on? (SOMBRE PIANO MUSIC) What's going on is he's still digging at his mum's place. The footing's ready to be poured, but the slab is still a couple of months away. And I suspect the nights might be getting a little lonely. Tess has a new teaching job, which is taking her out of town a lot, leaving Zac alone in his cold, rusty garage. Chris. Gidday, Zac. How you doing, mate? Good, man. Come on in. Nice to see ya. Yeah, you too. Wow. Come on down. The tour won't take long. Just sitting here thinking, 'Boy, better you than me.' I mean, here we are in the middle of winter, and you're in this nice, compact little garage. It's small, yep. And what happened to Tess? Yeah, she's` Has she done a runner already? I know, right? She never mentioned how much travel was in this new job of hers. So, it's convenient, isn't it? It's cold, and she's probably tucked up somewhere in a nice hotel. So, um... Oh! Company. Hey, everybody! Hello, hello. Hello, Chris. Nice to see you again. Oh, lovely to see you, I promised oysters. Fresh Bluff oysters. With Tess away, it's good to see Zac's mum, Carol, making sure his belly's full and spirits are up. So, you're pretty proud of all Zac's hard labour? Oh, well, I see the engineer's reports come through ` so, they're emailed to me. So I know he's passed our build. So I check it and say, 'Good work, Zac.' We're very proud. So, is this pretty much par for the course most evenings, after a hard day on the tools? Absolutely not. We're normally still hard at it, so this is a big reward. So, with a butty, there must be a typical way that you do this. You need to add some more, though, if you're gonna get your bread-to-chip ratio right. Oh, OK. I'd say you need to go more chips. You're forgetting sauce. 'Little did I know, my lesson on Southland sandwich architecture 'was really just to butter me up to help.' Mmm! 'And with Tess away, I could hardly say no.' Shorter days means working in the dark, whatever the conditions. But it's not all bad. Zac wanted to surprise me by getting a head start. Come through the doorway. Wow. Oh my goodness. It's such a good feeling, just to walk around on the slab. The thing for me, though, is the challenge of getting out of the sand was huge? Yes. But the craftsmanship that went into the slab was mental. (LAUGHS) Yeah, I know, right? So, tell me, we're here for a reason ` what are we doing? I need a hand with some frames. So it'd be great if you could give us a hand. And we'll lift a couple up. (GENTLE PIANO MUSIC) Oh, look at that! (FRAME SCRAPES) All right, and just slide to me, if possible. In a week where most nights drop below zero, most of Dunedin is sensibly home in front of the telly. But Zac's out here getting his house built. I like that about him. But it is concerning. Great. We are just at the beginning of winter. I'm just kind of thinking, 'Don't lose the plot, Zac.' No. I won't. Rug up, eat plenty. You don't notice it raining when you're this excited about putting frames up. Yeah, I mean, nights like this, where you do see something for your hard work, is pretty cool. Yeah. But it's not every night, so... So this is a good one, pouring with rain, middle of the night... (LAUGHS) Yeah. You're mad. (LAUGHS) Get home soaking, yeah. Zac makes light of his hard work, but he can't afford to get sick. Tess' new job means he'll be facing more cold nights building alone. (BRIGHT PIANO MUSIC) Tess has gone from teaching students to training lawyers. And the job has a lot of travel, so I've caught up with her in Auckland to find out how she feels about abandoning Zac. So you managed to escape the garage? (LAUGHS) Yeah. I feel guilty, probably, that I enjoy being out of the garage so much. How has that affected your involvement in the build? Does that mean that you're doing much less than you would have liked to have been doing? It means I'm not present. I think that's where the guilt sorta kicks in. It's really lonely in the middle of winter at 10 o'clock at night, building a house by yourself. And how do you think that Zac's getting on? I mean, are you worrying about him? He's very tired. He's working... really long hours now, just trying to get everything done. He's probably on his reserves, though. I think he's, um... Yeah, I don't think he's got another year of this in him. (LAUGHS) And when midwinter hits Dunedin, Zac's reserves must be running low. We went to have a shower, and we went to shake the gas bottle, and we couldn't cos it was frozen to the ground, so that was actually pretty funny. Yesterday was a write-off. Snow stopped work on both sites ` Zac's and his mum's. But as soon as the snow starts to melt, Zac's outside on his mum's build, trying to make up for lost time. We can do a few hours. If you're out in it for too long, you're probably gonna spend the next week in bed. Obviously hands don't work too well tying steel when the steel's all frozen to each other. (MOODY AMBIENT MUSIC) The harsh winter cold is slowing Zac down and making nights alone down the road even less appealing. The kind of desire to go down there at night can be somewhat lacking compared to the nicer times of the year. With his own house going much more slowly than he'd hoped, that initial moving-in date just isn't going to happen. Where we are at the moment, there's no way that it would be September. (LAUGHS) No. Not this year, anyway. In his fifth month of building day and night, seven days a week, it's clear Zac may have taken on way too much. (ORNATE CLASSICAL MUSIC) July brings some harsh weather to the Brighton coast in Dunedin, with delays to both Zac's builds. But the slab is now down at his mum's, and the framing up at his place. It's the weekend, so with the frozen pond starting to melt, and the sun out, Zac and Tess are spending the day building their roof. Today is, uh, Nailing 101. I usually require quite a bit of overseeing. (LAUGHS) Yeah, that's... (CHUCKLES) It's terrible! (LAUGHS) But Zac's really good about it. He'll always take the time to put down his tools and come and help me and show me what I'm supposed to be doing. We really made a concerted effort to say that this is gonna be a house that we're both gonna build. We're just gonna learn along the way and have a few laughs, and... Tap that in. It'll sit tight. Yes. And put a nail through. Could have been ugly if you don't work well together. It is also cool just working with someone. The weekends can be a whole lot more enjoyable if you're down here with someone else. Sundays, it's really easy to wanna stay in bed or, you know, just do something normal like go for brunch or something like that. But it's nice to be here and to be involved. And I know, looking back, I will have really appreciated the time put into it. But that's not to say that... (LAUGHS) There are some days where I just wish it would build itself. (LAUGHS) Yep. (LAUGHS) Yeah. That's not gonna happen. No. (LAUGHS) No. With the shape of their house starting to emerge from the sand dune, I'm keen to see where its inspiration came from. Working down the coast as an apprentice, Zac fell in love with the holiday home they were building. I can see a bit of Zac's house here. So much so that he asked its architect, Regan Johnston, to scale up this one-room bach. Gidday, Regan. Hi, Chris. Welcome to Taieri Mouth. Oh, thank you. Come on in and take a look at the house. Oh, what a lovely little gem. Gosh, what a great outlook. Yeah. It's amazing up here. Just high enough here to see over the top of the sand dunes, and the waves breaking. And at night, you can lie in bed and look back across to the lights of Dunedin. It was designed primarily as a weekend retreat ` small house, economical to build. And I was lucky enough to have a fantastic team of builders on the job at the time. And obviously Zac was one of those involved in the build. Yeah, Zac was one of those. He was just coming out of his time. He's quite fastidious, and you can certainly see that throughout his current project. He obviously loved the way that you design, because it's had a big influence on his current house. Yeah. Zac liked the characteristics of this home. He wanted a small home; maybe not quite so small as this house. He wanted it to be affordable as well. And him being the builder, he wanted to be able to do a lot of that work himself. There's a lovely kind of lightness and leanness to what you've done here, and I'm really looking forward to seeing that in Zac's place. I can see what Zac fell in love with here ` the simplicity, the timber and the wall of glass that makes you feel like you're on the beach. Turn this batch into a home, and you might feel like you're always on holiday. But there's no sense of holiday as spring arrives at Zac's build, and with it, increased building hours and daylight savings. Although it's a weekday, Zac's down at his place to oversee the giant roof beam going up. Up and over. So we're thinking through there. It's a big beam and a long reach ` too long for the first truck. Need a slightly bigger truck. So he's away to get the bigger one. (CRANE MOTOR WHINES) The massive ridge beam has been pre-cut to fit a steel plate. In a house where everything is exposed, there's a lot riding on getting these measurements just right. So, it's just getting that to marry up beautifully with not much clearance, is kind of tricky. If it could push that way... Yep. Yep, down. (TENSE MUSIC) That's it. And with a bit of persuasion, it fits, which must be a massive relief for Zac. It could have been a lot worse. Thought we were gonna have to get the big hammer out. But it actually went in not too bad. (GENTLE PIANO MUSIC) If Zac was just building one house, I make take the odds on being in by Christmas. But with the day job down the road finally taking shape, the pressure will be coming on to meet Carol and Jud's deadline. Some structural steel up, and the chimney's kind of been the main focal point of passers by, wondering what on Earth we're building, as they keep getting taller and taller. And basically the size comes down to the fact that they are taking out all the wobble out of the house. Although there's nothing going on with his mum's house on a Saturday, the reality of months of working day and night is starting to catch up with Zac. It's easy to forget about down the road, because you're nine or 10 hours here. Everyone disappears and you're down there by yourself, or just Tess and I. It's just real... really different, eh? With Zac's world shrinking to a windswept 500m2 radius, his mother, Carol, has been making sure he's kept fed and warm. It's been cold as hell, and it is bitter. We've bought him a new coat. (LAUGHS) And buying gloves, so they can keep on going. And he just keeps working. I don't think he's been able to afford to get sick. He's gotta be the person that's here at 8 o'clock in the morning for everybody else. And he's gotta be the person that's back down at that house at 4.30 to start building again. So, that's been his whole life. And he still trucks on, you know? Sitting out a freezing winter across the driveway, Zac and Tess must covet Carol and Judd's luxurious garage and inside bathroom. But it's all part of the plan. It is their dream together, and this is the only way they can get there, is, you know, Zac's gotta work full-time. He's gotta have a job that will allow him to do that. And it turns out the two-house arrangement is helping both Zac and his mum realise their dreams. It's the only way that it's allowed us to have our dream home. Because he is doing everything at not a company rate ` it's at my son's rate. So savings to everybody. But what cost to Zac? We look forward to it ending. And he can bike again, and he can have some time to himself. But I think it's been a real challenge, and I don't think we appreciated how huge it was, or how big the ask was. Mm. And as we head into spring, it goes on being challenging. After a full day building his mum's house, Zac is down at his site battling away on his own, hoping the rain lifts before Tess gets home from work. Ah, well, hopefully, if Tess comes down, we'll chuck some more rafters up. It's not too wet. The plan is have her down there nailing the bottom, and I'll nail the top. If we don't do this, then I suppose we're not gonna have a roof for Christmas. It's understandable if she doesn't wanna come down tonight. (LAUGHS) (SUBDUED CLASSICAL MUSIC) (SAW WHIRRS) Unfortunately, when she does arrive, the weather is even more miserable. Bit wet outside. Yeah. So no rafters today? No. With the rain making it too dangerous to work on the roof, it's another wet night in the garage, where there aren't a lot of options ` sit at the table, the couch, or go to bed. Pouring with rain outside. And that can be frustrating, and on the weekend, that happened ` it rained all of Sunday, and Zac's sort of like a Labrador at the window, just wanting it to stop raining so he can go outside. Looking at Zac tonight, I wonder if the rain and enforced rest might be no bad thing. Sometimes I call him down from the section early. I'm like, 'Nah, let's just call it. It's too much.' I think, you know, he's getting a little bit better at measuring when he needs to stop and eat... (LAUGHS) and, you know, drink water. Um,... yeah, I worry about him. But I think he's` I couldn't stop him if I tried, eh? (LAUGHS) We have a dream of just, like, when it's all ready, just taking down our toothbrushes and moving in, you know? That's kind of how we wanna do it. Yeah. But, also, as soon as Zac told me the glass was gonna be in before Christmas, I was like, 'Great, let's drag a mattress down and move in.' (LAUGHS) So, you know, it chops and changes. Yeah. Yeah. We're already at the end of October, and the house still has no roof or walls. Glass in by Christmas? Hmm. I wouldn't be packing my toothbrush yet. (CHEERFUL PIANO MUSIC) After a cold, dark, miserable winter, summer is finally here. And it's wonderful to see Zac and Tess out building together. The roof is on, and the skylights have gone in. Today they're putting up battens to prepare for the aluminium cladding. They've made good progress but are still a long way from closing the house in. With a week to Christmas, the windows are going to be next year. When they started the build, Tess thought they'd be in by the end of the year. Now she's caught up with the reality of building a house in your spare time. I had no concept of how much goes into a house build. And I think I was pretty quick off the mark to say, 'Invite the whole family around for Christmas.' So I've told them to hold on to those flights for a little bit longer, yeah. We could be living in it by Easter. It's just whether I would like to live in it when I'm not happy with it. I would rather it be completely finished, polished, cleaned, no more building or dust, and then you move in. (ETHEREAL MUSIC) By late February, Christmas has come and gone, and the southernmost tropical cyclone ever is lashing the South Island. Work has stopped on both sites, and with the glass not yet in, Zac's place is exposed to the elements. Zac's desperate to get the house watertight, but those massive windows are holding things up. Every piece is being craned in. We are slightly hamstrung by juggling the cranes, moving the scaffolding and the glass. And given that everyone's obviously screaming out for people at the moment, you've gotta get in line. Working around other tradies and the weather is slowing down Zac and Tess's place. It's also having an impact at Carol and Judd's. But like her son, Carol's not one to focus on obstacles. It's looking quite impressive, yes. It's amazing. And we're just waiting for the other end to go on too. Cos a little bit more steel work to come, but next to the sea, it's been rusting a little bit. Rusting a little bit? Yes. That means it's been standing here for a while. (LAUGHS) No, it's going really well. It's really well. And I think he's a little bit of a perfectionist. And so he wants to be a perfectionist here, and he wants to be a perfectionist down there. I think that must take its toll a little bit. Yeah. I think we've got a fairly major family Christmas here this year. What, and you think you're gonna be in for that? (LAUGHS) Yes. We'd better be. Was that a nervous laugh? Well, it was always going to be two years. And, so, two years is up at Christmas. So... Yeah. We'll see. We shall see, yeah. (BOTH LAUGH) There's a lot of blue sky up there, isn't there? That's a Christmas deadline for Mum, after Zac missed last Christmas for Tess. To keep things moving, he's juggling two builds today, with the big windows arriving down at his place. I didn't get a lot of sleep last night. I was a wee bit worried about... everything. With the house having no reveals, or architraves or skirtings or anything like that, everything comes down to the mil ` it has to be perfect. So it's kind of been up to me to make sure that's all gonna work. Good, yep. The triple-glazed panes are incredibly heavy, so as well as the crane, you need a big team to get them in place. They have to be shifted slowly and carefully. Ready, and, up! These are 200kg, plus. Gotta make sure you know exactly what you're doing and talk your way through it. The precise measurements of steel and glass means there is very little room for error. How close are we to the eaves, Toddy? With an entire sea-facing glass wall, getting these windows in will finally close the house in from the Dunedin weather. OK. Gotta watch the corner. As the two buildings have grown out of the sand, they've become visible to each other. And I can't help but wonder if Zac's head was in the day job at Mum's, if his heart might be down the road at his own home. There's no bangs or anything like that. So, that's good! (LAUGHS) He's all right? Yep. (HAMMERS BANG) (GENTLE MUSIC) With the house finally watertight, this is a real milestone for Zac, who gets to experience the inside of his house for the first time. Whoo. Cool. Big job ` lot of work for one day. It looks pretty cool. It's nice hearing an echo. (GENTLE ACOUSTIC GUITAR MUSIC) In this beautiful late summer, most people would want to be at the beach. Zac and Tess are, but even on weekends like this, they're hard at work, putting down topsoil and finishing the flashings. On days like this, we don't mind at all being out here. It's really nice. Suns out, and we're getting stuff done. But, you know, definitely I can imagine there being a Sunday where we're not working. It will be so nice to, like, wake up in the house and put the coffee on, and open the paper, and just, sit and be happy where we are. And that's gonna be such a treat. And the best thing about a solid Sunday building your own house is I bet it makes the afternoon beer tastes even better. Cheers. Cheers! Whoo. So what do you think of your day's work? Big day. What a big day. It's nice to see them getting a taste of what it's going to be like. But after a year of working 12-hour days, seven days a week, it might take more than a beer to recharge Zac's batteries. It's the middle of winter again, and Carol and Judd's complex roof design is proving a bit of a headache. Really big job, doing the roof. It's huge. Yeah, that's definitely taking up most of my time. Zac and Tess had originally hoped to be in their place last October. Then it was Christmas, and then Easter. It's now July, and they're still in the garage. The day job is having to take priority ` nothing like your mum setting the deadline. Since the get-go, she's wanted to have Christmas in this place. I see that happening. But, yeah, it's gonna make for a pretty interesting and pretty hectic last six months of the year. (GENTLE MUSIC) Zac and Tess are cladding their house in reverse-run aluminium. They've ordered it cut to measure from an Auckland factory. As an engineering geek, I thought I'd take the opportunity to see it coming off the roll. I reckon using aluminium is a smart decision. In that exposed coastal environment, it should stand up to whatever sand and salt is thrown at it. You'll know whether it fits if you hear no swearing. The pre-cut sheets have to fit perfectly for the house to be watertight. There's a gap in along here. It's called a negative detail. It gives you the shadow line all the way up. Very, very complicated. It's gotta be square and it's gotta be parallel. Inside the house, the new timber floor is getting a final sand. In a nice touch, Zac the Kiwi builder has chosen timber flooring that should make Tasmanian Tess feel right at home. It's Tasmanian Oak. Really beautiful wood. It's a pretty awesome house. His upstairs area is pretty awesome. He's talking about that's maybe where the guests would hang out, so I wouldn't mind being a guest in this house. (LAUGHS) After more than 16 months largely building this house in his spare time, it must be a strange but liberating feeling to walk down after work to see progress on a project he has been so hands-on with almost every step of the way. It actually looks even better than what I thought it was gonna be. Very, very good workmanship. Each job that is ticked off must feel like a concrete block being lifted from Zac's weary shoulders. From the outset, we wouldn't have ever liked to admit how long it was gonna take. You probably wouldn't have signed up to build a house in your weekends if you did know. I certainly don't think Tess would have signed up to two winters in the garage. And with both houses hanging over Zac's head, I do hope this South Island endurance builder can keep his energy up until the finish line. (GENTLE MUSIC) The last time I saw Zac, he was looking absolutely exhausted. And he still had two builds to complete. His mum was hoping to move in by Christmas, and he and Tess were still living in that cold garage. I can't wait to see what they've done. Whoo-hoo. Wonderful. My first impression is that this modern house feels like it's meant to be here, combining its bach heritage with perfect geometry. Hey, hey! Hey, Chris. Hey! Nice to see you. How you doing? Good to see you too! Lovely to see you. Wow. It's really shaped out well. It has, hasn't it? You wanna come have a look? Love to! (INSPIRING STRING MUSIC) Wow. This is really impressive. I mean, you first come in, and you just kind of think, 'Whoa!' It's the view that hits you, doesn't it? It certainly does. I mean, the total wrap-around, you can't miss it. You feel like you're literally in the sea. (BOTH LAUGH) Lovely timber floor. Yeah, so that's the Tassie oak. Reminds me a lot of my mum's kitchen, actually, which is nice. It looks fabulous. And it looks beautiful, with all the exposed structure, too. You're a stickler for detail, aren't you? Oh, I think it's worth it. It looked great. Fabulous. And I love the robustness of everything. And I'm just looking at the sheer scale of your wood burner; it's crazy! (BOTH LAUGH) Yeah. It's enormous. Yeah, we're very much looking forward to lighting it. It's a brand-new fireplace, but the refurbished furniture came from a woolshed in Wanaka. It looks a bit smarter than your average woolshed. (LAUGHS) Yeah. 'Upstairs, the real joy is the mezzanine.' This is lovely. Yeah. 'The deep bookshelf balcony makes it feel like its own private space.' It's got a real sense of intimacy up here. Yeah, this is a nice, cosy wee space. And love the paintings. (LAUGHS) Yeah, my dad painted those for us. So, they're sort of Tasmanian, New Zealand themed. 'And the cedar celling timbers are meticulously placed.' To be able to get a little bit of timber or a little bit of building happening to kind of show your trade, I think is nice. 'And setting off Zac's work is a perfect shadow line around the house.' One of my jobs was to line the floor with the MDF so that the gib stoppers could stop, and get that beautiful negative detail. Oh, this is a good spot. And it really feels like you're in an upturned boat here. (LAUGHS) Yeah, mm. Yeah. And where did the lampshade come from? Well, I was looking for a lampshade that had to be quite big, to sort of anchor the room. And, this is the biggest one I could find. (LAUGHS) (LAUGHTER) But I love it. It's a George Nelson, and it's actually added a lot more to the room than we would have anticipated, I think. (ETHEREAL MUSIC) Yeah, and then you've got this lovely space. It's great, isn't it? Yeah, the wee flat roof link between the living and the bedroom. Yeah, we'd always thought of this room as just kind of a thoroughfare, especially when we were building it. But now that it's actually here, it feels very much like a great space to be and a nice place to entertain. And what's this? Yeah, so this is one of our cavity sliders. So it's a really nice way to sort of lock off the different spaces. You can just pull it across. Oh, whoa! Very effective. (LAUGHS) You can come back now. (BOTH LAUGH) Gosh, that works really well. It feels like even though the house is small, it's been so thoroughly thought about. You've got so many different ways of using each and every space. The smaller pavilion is all about the master bedroom and the bed overlooking the sand dunes below. Oh, this feels just like a chapel. Yeah, I really like it. It's just kind of like a miniature version of that living room side. It's very cool that you got the same lamp that Tess chose from the other end. The mini version. The mini version. I love the stainless steel cross-bracing. I guess going to bed each night is a very religious experience. (BOTH LAUGH) (ATMOSPHERIC MUSIC) This has been such a massive push for you guys. And I'm constantly in amazement because of the fact that you did this all in your spare time. It's a bit of a DIY on the side job, which utterly blows me away. So congratulations for getting here. I mean, it's so impressive. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, I mean it was a... I think a far more intensive job than even what I had imagined. You know, it's been 18 months. And at the start we probably thought it would be half that. But I'd do it again. Mm. I think` You would do it again? Yeah, I mean, I'd build this again tomorrow. Would you, Tess? Um... (LAUGHS) No, because we've already got it. So, you know, done! (LAUGHS) What are the parts of the house that you're super proud of? The glass was always gonna be pretty magic. Then the timber floors, which we hadn't planned on doing, and then they came up so beautifully. I dunno if I have a favourite, other than the fact that we built it. How about budget? Because the budget at the beginning, was it 250? Uh, yeah. I thought it was three. (LAUGHS) But, um, we would have been trying for 250 at the start, that's right. Last Christmas, it was looking pretty good. And then I suppose we introduced a lot more kind of finishing materials. So the rubber band kind of stretched, the budget went... (SQUEAKS) Yeah. So what did it end up costing in the end? It was about 400. Mm. Yeah, if it was that, then I'd be quite happy. There's a lot of house here. For 400? Yes. (GENTLE GUITAR MUSIC) And now you're in the sun, and you've got a whole summer ahead of you. I know. It's pretty beautiful. Yeah. I'm looking forward to not waking up every Saturday and Sunday at 7 o'clock with Zac saying, 'Right, get your boots on, let's go.' It'll be really nice just to be lazy for a bit. There's no time for Zac to be lazy. He's promised Carol and Judd they'll be in by Christmas. He may have finally moved into his house, but he'll be back up the road 24/7. Uh, it's gonna be really tight. But they'll be living in it. Yeah, it'll be probably not as finished as what this house is. The upside is that Zac can focus on the day job, now his own house is finished. But of course, he won't have his star apprentice. The way that you worked together with Tess to take her through all of those skills in a very kind of open, loving, supportive kind of way ` I mean, how many builders do that on-site? (ALL LAUGH) It's more like, 'Oi!' Yeah, there was a few 'oi's. (ALL LAUGH) Uh, it was fun. We very much tried to make sure we enjoyed it and appreciated the privilege for what it was, which was building a beautiful house in a beautiful place. It really is the house that Zac and Tess built. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's pretty special. Mm. Yeah. (BRIGHT PIANO MUSIC) Building this house nearly killed Zac, but he did it. He and Tess did it together. It's their shared approach to building that I find so incredibly inspiring. And it's not just any house. It's small and perfectly formed. So often we celebrate beachside behemoths. But a perfect little house can be the best grand design of all. (BRIGHT MUSIC) Captions by John Gibbs Edited by James Brown Captions were made with the support of NZ On Air. www.able.co.nz Copyright Able 2018