Restoring the Cuckoo
Kategori: Construction, Greece, Travel
The Cuckoo Yurt is the largest of the sleeping areas at the Test Site. With two floors inside and beds for fifteen people, it's an awesome structure for hosting guests at Free & Real!
It's now over seven years since it was constructed, and the wooden platform surrounding the yurt has taken its toll. It's become time for doing some restoration work!
First off we spent two days removing the deck. Some beams and boards had gotten into quite bad shape, but many were still good enough for getting reused. And we had already started to plan for how to get them back into action!
We moved the large pillars in under the yurt to support the structure. Since it previously had been built on a square foundation, it took some puzzling, pushing and shoving to get a new outer support layer that fitted the round shape of the yurt.
First off, we got some long and sturdy poles into the ground. These would be the corners of the new hallway, which we had spent many a good hours sketching on, before settling on version 4:12b (that later would become version 5:2c, that included windows and a very nice flooring solution).
Next we marked, with care, the absolute most optimal placement for the first platfrom for our grand construction ahead.
More poles go down!
Johannes takes on the task of getting a splendid fit for the frame of the platform.
After meticulous examinations and extensive disciussions we form the layout for our second platform. In the end it is connected to four poles and got two beams underneath that are connected to the main support pillar of the yurt. A platform sturdier than the concept of sturdiness itself!
We returned to the planning corner for some hard thinking of the next phase.
"It is so dense, every single image has so many things going on!" - Rick McCallum
Just feel it having happened!
The stones hand picked and carried from the quarry, the second resting perfectly on three smaller ones.
The first platform connected to them with two additional steps.
And Johannes sawing the first board of the top platform to an exact fit between the two poles and the curvature of the yurt.
It's all coming together!
And here comes maybe the most ingenious solution of them all - The turn step!
And the wood used for the steps are all from the old deck, cleaned and sanded.
So it was sketched, discussed, re-sketched, talked about, adjusted, changed just a little bit, decided upon, talked about for a while more and done!
The IKEA team celebrates at the peak of their newest creation - the new Cuckoo stairway!
But it is not finished just yet...
A safety railing, from newly cut trees at Johannes's land, rasped and polished. Note how the bark is left on the topmost railing, and smoothly transfers into the neat sanded part.
And here it is! The brand new stairway! (Awaiting a brand new stairway room)
