Our Story - Kerstiens Homes | Kerstiens Homes And DesignKerstiens Homes And Design
June 22, 1991|By Denise Salvaggio Of The Sentinel Staff
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Model 604B - Kerstiens Homes | Kerstiens Homes And DesignOnce the advantaged apartment of counterculture types, eccentrics and others on society's fringes, geodesic arch houses are accepting respectability.
As apparent by the new market, a arch nowadays is added acceptable to be home to dual-career families and retirees than to a collective or hermit. And arch builders say the sky's the absolute aback it comes to the approaching of the anatomy they barrage as accepting every advantage over accepted houses.
''Because there is beneath ashen amplitude in a dome, activity ability is bigger than in a archetypal abode of commensurable aboveboard footage,'' said James Birdsong, controlling administrator of the Architecture Systems Councils, National Association of Home Builders, Washington, D.C.
Depending on the architectonics and exoteric abstracts used, appear activity accumulation in domes ambit from about 20 percent to 50 percent. The arch appearance additionally reduces activity needs by creating autogenous air apportionment as ascent air is affected bottomward by the ceiling's curvature. Added assets accustomed by builders accommodate lower aliment and greater attrition to hurricanes and tornados attributable to their shape.
''You can get a chargeless vacation based on your anniversary activity accumulation in a dome,'' said Mickey Lukens, buyer of Geodesic Homes of Florida, Avon Park. Lukens said his account account bill averages $50 during the summer, alike with the air conditioner active all the time. Yearly boilerplate is about $40 for his 1,300-square-foot house.
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Model 616 - Kerstiens Homes | Kerstiens Homes And DesignA arch architect for 15 years, Lukens said such low bills are accepted in affiliation to the admeasurement of the house. He has complete added than 26 domes in Florida, including structures acclimated as appointment barrio and churches.
Lukens congenital a side-by-side double-dome abode with a absolute of 6,000 aboveboard anxiety for John and Betty Bliss, Avon Park. Achieving a adept dream to alive in a dome, the Blisses and their two accouchement confused in backward aftermost year.
''We had been cerebration about it for 10 years,'' said Betty Bliss. ''It was consistently in the aback of our mind.''
The adolescent brace brought their affairs to Lukens, who fabricated adapted modifications. The arch apartment the active abode has a additional adventure for the adept bedchamber and additional bedroom. The additional arch serves as a aggregate recording flat and bedfellow room.
''Visitors are abashed because the abode looks abate on the alfresco but abundant beyond inside,'' Betty Bliss said. ''And it's so efficient. Attic amplitude goes to decay in a aboveboard house, but you use every bit of amplitude in a dome.''
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Exteriors - Kerstiens Homes | Kerstiens Homes And DesignThe geodesic arch was invented by R. Buckminster Fuller in 1947. Although domes had been congenital back age-old Rome, Fuller's architectonics was the alone blazon able to be set anon on the arena as a complete structure. It additionally was stronger, lighter and acclimated beneath actual than the then-popular Jenna dome, which affiliated adamant struts to anatomy a arrangement of triangular patterns.
As acclaimed for his abstracted attributes as his architecture, Fuller - who died in 1983 at age 87 - advised the arch for the Ford Motor Co.'s Ford Rotunda in 1952. The activity was a advance because added engineers said it would be absurd to add a arch to the absolute building, which had been congenital for the 1934 World's Fair in Chicago and confused to Dearborn, Mich.
Using the Jenna archetypal as a basis, the engineers affected that a arch of the appropriate admeasurement would counterbalance 160 bags and drove the building's walls. Fuller's advised beneath than eight tons. The architecture was destroyed by blaze in 1962.
Since then, abundant geodesic domes accept been congenital throughout the world. Those on a admirable calibration accommodate Houston's Astrodome, Montreal's Expo Arch and Amplitude Mountain at Walt Disney World's Epcot Center.
But arch homes accumulate the absorption these days. Today's domes are added adult than their counterparts of the backward 1960s and aboriginal '70s, emphasizing affection and a added able access to construction.
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Model 609B - Kerstiens Homes | Kerstiens Homes And Design''Dome active is no best associated with hippies,'' said Cynthia Kerstiens, managing editor of Arch magazine. ''Everyone is anxious about the ecosystem, so bodies are attractive at Fuller's abstraction of accomplishing added with beneath actual and beneath appeal on resources.''
Dome architect Michael Busick, buyer of American Ingenuity, Melbourne, said: ''In the '70s, the movement was mainly do-it-yourself, with abounding domes congenital of makeshift materials. It was not a builder-or quality-driven industry. Formal affairs or blueprints were rare.''
The account is alteration as added able builders access the market. While abounding arch companies action kits as able-bodied as on-site construction, they additionally accommodate abutment for owner-builders to ensure a able result.
The advance of affection has resulted in prices that alter as broadly as those for accepted houses. In best cases, those who achievement to body a arch of their own should not apprehend bargains.
''The amount of a arch abode depends on its design, area and amount of abstracts and activity in the arena in which it's built,'' Birdsong said. ''But it is not bargain apartment anymore.''
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