Greenhouse Living
Swedish Couple Builds A Greenhouse Around Their Stockholm Home
This couple from Sweden, Charles Sacilotto, and Marie Granmar built a greenhouse around their environmentally friendly home in Stockholm to keep it warm throughout the entire year.
Keeping it simple, Granmar says of the house:
It's like a bubble.
The average temperature in Stockholm, Sweden, hovers around 27 degrees Fahrenheit outside. However, inside the "bubble", temperatures reach up to 68 degrees Fahrenheit on the glass-covered rooftop deck of the house. Who would have thought that putting a greenhouse around your home in Stockholm would have such a profound effect? The old roof of the house was removed and turned into a sunlight living area space with lounge chairs, where the family can enjoy a sunbath, read books, or play with their son.
The house also has insulation and heat, because when temperatures drop into the negative numbers, the house gets cold. The only difference between a typical home and this "bubble" house, is that it wouldn't need to use the heat as often. Also, they can grow their own food such as cucumbers, grapes, figs, tomatoes, and herbs even during the Nordic winter, whereas, in a typical house, the plants wouldn't survive.
Sacilotto got inspired by the Swedish eco-architect, Bengt Warne, to make his family's home draped in a glass blanket. In 1974, Warne designed the first home within a greenhouse, called a Nature House or Naturhus.
The family initially looked for an empty lot to build their Naturhus, but instead, they decided to make it on the land of an old, small summer home in Stockholm archipelago. They surrounded the house in a 4-millimeter pane of glass, that cost around $84,000 to install, and left plenty of room for a garden that wraps around the home. Sacilotto claims it's safe to live inside a glass greenhouse. "It's security glass. So, in principle, this can't break. If it ever does, it will break in tiny pieces to not harm anyone," he said.
Additionally, the couple was able to re-do the exterior of their home with all the money they saved from using solar energy. They covered the new wood facade with only linseed oil since their house doesn't come in contact with rain, snow, or wind.
This family is extremely environmentally conscious and incredibly self-sufficient. They compost all garden and kitchen waste, and they also collect rainwater for household needs and for watering their plants. Sacilotto, who is an engineer, even re-designed the house's sewage system. "The sewage system begins with a urine-separating toilet and uses centrifuges, cisterns, grow beds and garden ponds to filter the water and compost the remains," explained Fair Companies.
If you also want to save energy and build a greenhouse around your home, Grammar claims the process is simple and anyone can do it.
Source: https://www.intelligentliving.co/swedish-couple-builds-greenhouse-around-home/
