# Lake Chapala architects



## wanghaozhi (Nov 9, 2017)

My wife and I are reading "Designing Your Perfect House" by William J. Hirsch. It's an enjoyable book to read. The book is guiding us to think about houses in a different way.

Whether we build or remodel a house in the Lake Chapala area, it seems that we might want to hire an architect. It would be preferable to hire one that lives/works locally. I suppose that Guadalajara would work as well.

Does anyone have experience with working with a local architect to either build or remodel a home in the Lake Chapala area?

Looking forward to some interesting and useful replies.

Thanks in advance.


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## surabi (Jan 1, 2017)

I don't know that book, but there's another you may find interesting- called "A Pattern Language".
Written by a bunch of hot shot young architects from Berkeley in the 70's. They spent several years compiling info from all over the world on what makes homes and communities livable. Written in short one page or less sections, which then have numbers to link you to other sections which talk about similar or related things, they cover things you would never think about.
Examples: Balconies that are less than 6' wide seldom get used. 
Windows that give the feeling of being outside don't need to be large, but need to go 
down to about 12" off the floor
If you have a fantastic view, it is much more interesting to put smaller, different 
shape and size windows on different levels there, rather than a big picture window, 
so when you move around the room you get a different view from various angles.

I don't know if that book is readily available, but definitely worth looking for.


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## wanghaozhi (Nov 9, 2017)

*Thanks, surabi*



surabi said:


> I don't know that book, but there's another you may find interesting- called "A Pattern Language".
> Written by a bunch of hot shot young architects from Berkeley in the 70's. They spent several years compiling info from all over the world on what makes homes and communities livable. Written in short one page or less sections, which then have numbers to link you to other sections which talk about similar or related things, they cover things you would never think about.
> Examples: Balconies that are less than 6' wide seldom get used.
> Windows that give the feeling of being outside don't need to be large, but need to go
> ...


I've just put a hold on it at the library. Thank you very much.


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## surabi (Jan 1, 2017)

You're welcome. Cool that you could get it at the library. Enjoy.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

The first thing to do is sit down and see how you live, what your habits are and make a list of those requirements because you are not going to change, except for becoming less mobile as you get older..Also think of security..etc..then make a list of your wants and needs and give that to the architect.. get an architect that will put your needs in front ofhis ego and design..


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## wanghaozhi (Nov 9, 2017)

*Thanks, citlali*



citlali said:


> The first thing to do is sit down and see how you live, what your habits are and make a list of those requirements ...


Thanks, citlali. The book I mentioned in the first post talks about that. My wife and I are reading the first pass. When we finish that, we will back through, and do the things you suggest. 



> you are not going to change, except for becoming less mobile as you get older..


Good advice. We are now thinking about one floor or two, or at least having the master bedroom on the first floor precisely because of that.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

master bedroom and full bath.. I have never read a book on how ro build houses or remodel but it is all pretty logical.. Yhe winery where I worked was built by world famous architect and they competed with I M Pei ..
The lighting was awfull and not practical, the glass doors very dangrous , the desks were awfull and not practical , we lacked files space and on and on..The building was séctacilar but a lot of the details were no good as the design took precedent over practicability. That is my ***** about architect.. many let their design and ego fet in the way of funccionality. 
I used a couple of young architect for remodelling and got what I wanted but I was watching every step lke a hawk, and actually fired the architect toweards the end of the project and finished the building of fireplaces , electricity and many other details directly with the electrician and the maestro od the albañoles.. so I have no one to recommend...


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## lagoloo (Apr 12, 2011)

An "architect" in Mexico is often a "guy who's built a house" so check the credentials.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

There are great architects in Mexico and architectural schools but some people are calling themselves architects when they can draw...They also have structural engineers. When I rebuilt the house in Chiapas I did it with an engineering firm and used an architect for the designs.


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## surabi (Jan 1, 2017)

I designed my own home, no architect. Just had to get an engineer's drawing, which worked off my drawings, to get the building permit.

I agree that most architects are all about showing how clever they are and will try to push their ideas on you, rather than just designing according to your wishes.

One place where house design falls down is the kitchen- I see really badly designed kitchens, even in expensive homes. There is something called the golden triangle when designing a kitchen- makes for an efficient work space. I usually see the fridge placement here done really badly- like an afterthought. Over at the end of the kitchen, with no counter next to it to put your groceries down on when loading or taking things out of the fridge, fridge door opening the wrong way.


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## lagoloo (Apr 12, 2011)

A lot of kitchens I've seen have obviously been designed by people who DON'T COOK. That's how it happens that the fridge opens the wrong way with no spot to put the groceries going into it.
Moral; get someone who cooks to help design the kitchen.

And then, there's counter height: on our massive house remodel from the days when the kitchen had a dirt floor, both my contractor and my spouse were around 6'2" tall. This was reflected in the counter height. By the time I found out......too late. (I'm only 5' 5"). Someday, some tall lady is gonna love it. Moral: get some input from the lady.


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## lat19n (Aug 19, 2017)

I don't think we have ever had an architect come by the house. The previous owners relied on an architect for everything - and paid through the nose (they gave us all the receipts). We received all these architectural diagrams from the previous owners. The structure of the house is depicted properly but the plumbing/electrical not so much. Last year we had to dig up the fosa septica. It was shown on the drawings but in the end it was no where near where it was shown. 

We have had many engineers at the house over the years. Some have been better than others. We do rely totally on referrals from our Mexican friends. We just built a second, larger cistern. The engineer quoted us but the job went on for much longer than anyone thought possible. We felt sorry for him and paid the cost of plumbing ourselves on top of the engineer's fee. But - an engineer is someone who drops off workers in the morning, leaves, brings them lunch, leaves and then picks them up at the end of the day.

We prefer to deal with the specialists that the engineer hires - directly. Take the cistern - a good friend had that same engineer build a swimming pool. She had the contact info for the guy who handled the electrical/plumbing. We used that same guy to handle the plumbing for our cistern - with the full knowledge of the engineer - after all - we paid the guy ourselves... He is a keeper.


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## surabi (Jan 1, 2017)

lat19n- you are actually confusing the term engineer for contractor. The contractors are the ones who drop their crews off and pick them up at the end of the day, they add a percentage for themselves on to the cost of the materials, and are notorious for underbidding a job, then telling you it will cost more because they failed to factor in a bunch of things.
An engineer is a qualified professional who does structural drawings showing where the rebar, etc, needs to go and is well versed in foundation work which will handle the loads necessary, where bearing walls need to go, etc.


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## lat19n (Aug 19, 2017)

surabi said:


> lat19n- you are actually confusing the term engineer for contractor. The contractors are the ones who drop their crews off and pick them up at the end of the day, they add a percentage for themselves on to the cost of the materials, and are notorious for underbidding a job, then telling you it will cost more because they failed to factor in a bunch of things.
> An engineer is a qualified professional who does structural drawings showing where the rebar, etc, needs to go and is well versed in foundation work which will handle the loads necessary, where bearing walls need to go, etc.


Not our experience. The people I call engineers are REALLY ingenieros. Like the brother of our Canadian/Mexican real estate agent who was a civil engineer - with a degree as such. btw - the real estate agent was a chemical engineer by training. 

We have adopted the practice of having anyone we ever pay a peso to complete a short form which is dated, describes the work performed, has their name on it and ours, the dollar amount and either paid in full or what the quoted price is and what balance is remaining. We have them sign the form. In the case of the cistern the 'engineer' said he needed more cement and he signed one of our forms saying this was a prepayment for supplies but also showing the correct remaining balance. 

We have a very small tight-knit group of Mexican friends. Some of them are very well off. As a group we are rather good source for work if we are all treated well. If someone does not treat one of us well - the rest of the group is made aware.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

engineer is a general term and you need to specific what kind of engineer you want. We had a structural engineer in Chiapas build the house and he did a great job but all the designs for fireplaces, kitchen etc were done by an architect acording to my specifications. You have to revuew everything if you want to make sure to get what you want.. The electrical plan had a plug in the front of the fireplace to put a tv , I am glad I caught that one.. Also plugs are single plugs as I found out the hard way if you want a plug where 2 plugs can go in you have to specify double plug.. . We have a traditional 2 patio house and I also found out that the switches were on the pitside walls when I wanted them in the inside on most rooms. At 7000 feet I do not enter the house from everyroom from the patio , we go through the house so I wanted the switches configured that way but trditionally the switches are on the outside walls,, People here use the house and live differently so you have to watch out for the details.. Ajijic is more foreign friendly.. and used to foreignrs so I did not have that problem..no matter what you have to watch every detail.. I think I had the first garbage disposal in San Cistobal and there was no switch on the plan, I was told that all I had to do is to unplug and plug the disposal when I wanted to use it...


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## lat19n (Aug 19, 2017)

citlali said:


> engineer is a general term and you need to specific what kind of engineer you want. We had a structural engineer in Chiapas build the house and he did a great job but all the designs for fireplaces, kitchen etc were done by an architect acording to my specifications. You have to revuew everything if you want to make sure to get what you want.. The electrical plan had a plug in the front of the fireplace to put a tv , I am glad I caught that one.. Also plugs are single plugs as I found out the hard way if you want a plug where 2 plugs can go in you have to specify double plug.. . We have a traditional 2 patio house and I also found out that the switches were on the pitside walls when I wanted them in the inside on most rooms. At 7000 feet I do not enter the house from everyroom from the patio , we go through the house so I wanted the switches configured that way but trditionally the switches are on the outside walls,, People here use the house and live differently so you have to watch out for the details.. Ajijic is more foreign friendly.. and used to foreignrs so I did not have that problem..no matter what you have to watch every detail.. I think I had the first garbage disposal in San Cistobal and there was no switch on the plan, I was told that all I had to do is to unplug and plug the disposal when I wanted to use it...


Funny - we threw out the garbage disposal under the kitchen sink to make room for the RO system...

We hung our flat screen TV on the wall over the fireplace. But - now I have to run an extension cord/power strip from a rather far away outlet. I was thinking of having our albanil chip away at the wall and insert a four plug fixture closer to the TV.


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## surabi (Jan 1, 2017)

citlali said:


> engineer is a general term and you need to specific what kind of engineer you want. We had a structural engineer in Chiapas build the house and he did a great job but all the designs for fireplaces, kitchen etc were done by an architect acording to my specifications. You have to revuew everything if you want to make sure to get what you want.. The electrical plan had a plug in the front of the fireplace to put a tv , I am glad I caught that one.. Also plugs are single plugs as I found out the hard way if you want a plug where 2 plugs can go in you have to specify double plug.. . We have a traditional 2 patio house and I also found out that the switches were on the pitside walls when I wanted them in the inside on most rooms. At 7000 feet I do not enter the house from everyroom from the patio , we go through the house so I wanted the switches configured that way but trditionally the switches are on the outside walls,, People here use the house and live differently so you have to watch out for the details.. Ajijic is more foreign friendly.. and used to foreignrs so I did not have that problem..no matter what you have to watch every detail.. I think I had the first garbage disposal in San Cistobal and there was no switch on the plan, I was told that all I had to do is to unplug and plug the disposal when I wanted to use it...


You are so right- the switch and plug placements are a seemingly little thing that can end up being highly annoying and inconvenient if placed wrong. I actually have a few light switches in my house which are 2-way, which is very convenient and is easy to do if you are constructing from scratch. For instance, my patio light can be switched on or off from the inside or the outside. Also have a switch on the wall just inside the bedroom door, so you are not walking into a dark room, but there is also a switch for that light by the bed, so you don't have to get up to turn it off. But other switches that I didn't plan out well ended up being behind a window when it is opened, so rather annoying.


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## surabi (Jan 1, 2017)

lat19n said:


> Funny - we threw out the garbage disposal under the kitchen sink to make room for the RO system...
> 
> We hung our flat screen TV on the wall over the fireplace. But - now I have to run an extension cord/power strip from a rather far away outlet. I was thinking of having our albanil chip away at the wall and insert a four plug fixture closer to the TV.


The albanil is fine for chipping away at the wall, just make sure he doesn't hit an electrical conduit or water line while doing it! And unless he is a qualified electrician, I'd get one of those to wire for a new plug, otherwise you could end up with a jimmy job of little pieces of electrical wire help together with electrical tape instead of proper wire nuts and junction boxes. Been there.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

ha ha ..yes been there too.. 

Funny Lat18 and it is why you have to know what you want and how you live when you build a house. Everyone is diferent. We have no RO system and have been fine without one for 18 years but do not take the garbage disposal from me or do not hang your flat screen over the fireplace..


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## lagoloo (Apr 12, 2011)

Everybody is definitely different. I have art work over my fireplace. My TV sits modestly in a corner with a handwoven fabric covering it when it's not in use. I can live without a garbage disposal, but *gotta *have the dishwasher.


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## TundraGreen (Jul 15, 2010)

citlali said:


> ha ha ..yes been there too..
> 
> Funny Lat18 and it is why you have to know what you want and how you live when you build a house. Everyone is diferent. We have no RO system and have been fine without one for 18 years but do not take the garbage disposal from me or do not hang your flat screen over the fireplace..


What is an RO system? I rewired my house. I used wire nuts for all the wire connections and installed a grounding rod and ran ground through the whole house. I put in a master switch and two distribution boxes with multiple circuits, and used appropriately sized cable for all the wiring. All those practices seem to be unheard of in Mexico. Before the rewiring the whole house was on one fuse with 16 gauge wiring throughout. Lots of the wiring was burnt from overloading in the past.


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## lat19n (Aug 19, 2017)

TundraGreen said:


> What is an RO system? I rewired my house. I used wire nuts for all the wire connections and installed a grounding rod and ran ground through the whole house. I put in a master switch and two distribution boxes with multiple circuits, and used appropriately sized cable for all the wiring. All those practices seem to be unheard of in Mexico. Before the rewiring the whole house was on one fuse with 16 gauge wiring throughout. Lots of the wiring was burnt from overloading in the past.


RO = reverse osmosis.

So maybe between the period from Thanksgiving until New years we had a new cistern dug out. We left the old one in place to handle the sprinkler system and had a new one made maybe 10' deep X 10' wide by 12' long. (I'm not sure what the volume of that is - but during all that digging some of the 1" orange electrical tubes were exposed. We (my wife and I) were very concerned that those would be embedded in the cement walls of the new cistern and would render them not maintainable in the future. No problem said the 'engineer'. 

Well the job was completed and a week or so later there was a loud POP from the area of the new cistern. It blew out the 3 fuses in our house-wide voltage regulator box and threw the breaker to our 220 pool pump. Turns out one of the 4 lines to the pool pump was shot. I put a few days effort into trying to uncover the buried cabling but in the end opted to have new 10 gauge cabling (4 lines) installed along the top property wall. 

The guy doing the work had to head to Huatulco for a family emergency - but hopefully we will complete that project this week.

I know that things are not grounded properly in the house as we have a mid-priced surge protector (for our modems/routers etc) that tells me so. Too many projects...


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

The electrical system in the house in Ajijic was appaling as well and a friend of hours who was an electrical enginee redid the whole thing.. except for the wiring in the garden,, We just got a new gardner and the firt thing he did was to sever an electrical line to all lamps in the garden so we removed them all..I cannot believe how lines get burried at 2 cm, in the ground in the garden.. it is insane but pretty typical.. Every time I hear "no problem" I go on red alert because you can be sure that there will be a problem..


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## Isla Verde (Oct 19, 2011)

citlali said:


> . . Every time I hear "no problem" I go on red alert because you can be sure that there will be a problem..


A bit like "ahorita" meaning not any time in the near future!


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## surabi (Jan 1, 2017)

Getting back to new construction- when I built my place here in Mexico, I had lived here long enough to know that people have to repaint the outsides of their houses every few years due to the blazing sun and the torrential rains. Instead of painting, I had my crew mix the powdered color into the plaster mix. In my case, I wanted "dirt" color, so it would never look dirty, as dust is so prevalent, and the rains splash mud up against the lower walls. But there are lots of colors to choose from.

This finish requires that each batch of plaster mix is measured- same exact amount of sand, cement and color in each batch. Even so, it doesn't necessarily all turn out exactly uniform, as next load of sand or cement might be different than the previous, but as long as they don't end one batch of plastering in a straight line, having it random instead, it really looks fine. 

After it was well-cured, it had a coat of clear sealer put on (not shiny- the stuff they call 5 to 1 sellador, which to all appearances is just basically the same as Elmers glue and cheap to boot-whatever you do, never use the stuff called Sellacril- it yellows and peels off in sheets). It has held up great, the color fades slightly in time, but no big deal, and I eliminated all the costs of repainting every few years. Friends liked it enough that they did the same thing.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

Great idea, they use that type of finish in France and it saves money over time..


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