It's a very small, confined space.
Especially for somebody with a motorised wheelchair.
There's only so much room to manoeuvre when you're designing
for a feisty 12 year old and his motorized wheelchair.
It's not just about doing up a house.
This was about fundamentals of how you function in a house.
Accessibility is all very well but there's no place like home.
Your house is your home.
You build your own house to your own needs.
< And you make a home.
I'm really excited.
I can't wait until the whole thing is finished.
Ann and Barry live in a 1970's semi-D in Malahide, North Dublin.
It's a lot less sociable than they are.
It would be really nice to have extra space for living in
and socialising in.
When we'd have people round we'd have a makeshift table here,
we'd extent it out.
There'd be literally pieces of cardboard to get it the same level.
We'd always be saying we've so many plans. We're going to do this.
We've plans for the house but then as soon as they went
we'd say nothing because as soon as we'd start talking about it together
we'd have to start doing something about it.
Finally the time has come.
But the renovation Ann and Barry want isn't just inspired by their own needs.
4 years ago, as his teacher Ann formed a very special bond with
12 year old Michael, that's blossomed since Michael began visiting
the couple for respite breaks from his residential accommodation.
We were both in the same school for a few years. Yeah.
It wasn't a very big school but we were both in the same
school but we didn't know each other really. Yeah.
Until I was your teacher. Yeah.
I'm going to read the part. You're Chip.
Okay, you can be Edward.
She was alright.
Just alright.
Stop that. I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation for those sounds.
What if it's a bear? Or a werewolf?
Or a monster.
The first time I met Michael it was on his communion.
I just get really emotional. Sorry.
Who are you? Are you going to eat us?
As well as what we want to improve the house for ourselves, we want
to improve the house for him and for the three of us when he's here.
Designing for three people with very different needs will be
a major challenge for Dermot.
He'll have to combine the sociability Ann and Barry want
with the space and access that Michael needs.
He's very excited about it and he's very interested.
He's come to know this house very well so he's fascinated
with how it could possibly change.
At the moment you're sleeping in the sitting room. Yeah.
Do you want to show me where you sleep? Yes.
That's a bit tight there Michael, is it? Yes.
Michael always comes with his bag packed. Isn't that right. Yeah.
We kind of have to throw the bag under the stairs at the moment.
It'd be nice for him to bring his back into his own bedroom.
This is where you sleep. So how does this work?
When it's bed time we have to just turn this into a bedroom.
So we have a fold out bed. Mattress down.
And we all snuggle in for the night.
So other than a bedroom Michael, what would you like?
I would like a bath. Okay. Have you any ideas for a bath?
I'd like loads of water. I like it deep.
So it's one of your favourite things to do then, is it? Yeah.
You love water and you love deep water.
I'm really excited about this design because it's more than just about a room layout.
It's more than just about a sitting room, a kitchen.
I really want to make this a house of the senses.
I want the garden to be right inside in the main living space.
I want it to be filled with light.
Things like the bath will be incredibly important.
Michael loves water. He loves having his bath.
What about bubbles? Yeah!
That's going to be the really fun part and that's the bit
I'm really excited about.
The dimensions and layout of this modest suburban house were
never designed for a wheelchair.
That's twice Michael. Both sides you hit that door.
You're a very good driver. Aren't you. Yeah.
He's a very good driver but sometimes it gets stuck
and you have to..
Stuck again!
How easy is it to get out in the garden at the moment?
Not great.
We have to get the ramp.
Barry, I'm okay. I know, just in case.
You're just nervous.
I am sometimes nervous with you driving on the uneven ground.
As well as remodelling the house to create better access for Michael,
Dermot will have to consider Barry and Ann who've spent
years dreaming of a sociable contemporary home.
You might not think this is possible because we're sitting in a bright
orange kitchen that we inherited from 1970, but I do kind of like
quite clean, modern style.
Michael also has designs on the kitchen.
I would like presses that I can open by myself.
Not tough ones.
On one side of the house there's a garage that's used largely for storage.
This is very much a wasted space.
Okay. It's a bright space.
You've got all this sunlight coming in.
When you come out here in the morning it's beautifully lit.
It's become a utility space.
So you've a dishwasher.. It doesn't work.
A washing machine, an extra fridge and a microwave that we don't use.
A lovely book case.
So these have all been here since you bought the house? Yes.
Tell me how much money you have to spend on the project.
130,000.
Isn't that all we have.
Maybe a bit more! No, we don't!
Let me go away, do a couple of sketches and I'll bring them
back and see what you think. Fantastic. Look forward to it.
Deal? Yeah.
They really want to make sure that when he is here that the house
suits his needs and that he has independence and that,
along with making it the social hub for Ann and Barry, that's the project.
So getting the two of them, mashing them together.
That's the essence of this project.
In order to merge form and function, Dermot's aesthetic sense will have
to give way to practicality.
That will be especially difficult to achieve on this project.
Wide navigable corridors and open plan communal areas
require the very thing Ann and Barry's house doesn't have. Space.
The key to the whole design here is going to be accessibility for Michael.
Getting from A to B with ease.
There's guidelines out there that will tell you exactly
how to do it but they're all for big spaces.
We don't have that. We've got a 3 bed semi.
Every inch of space is going to be hugely important.
The design is going to have to be clever and to do that,
I'm going to have to talk to as many different people who will
inform me what needs to happen and what doesn't need to happen
so we can get the very, very basics right and it'll work for Michael.
To see just what Barry, Ann and Michael can expect for their
130,000 euro budget, it's over to quantity surveyor, Patricia Power.
Rather worryingly, she's not worried!
There must be no money issues, is there?
No major major issues.
Okay. Where are we at with this?
We are coming in at 130,000.
That includes all the upgrade for the main house,
which is the ground floor refurb, the garage conversion and
the extension at ground floor. That's great.
Yeah. It is great.
And then we've got 10K for landscaping.
10K for landscaping, that's front and back.
We're bang on budget which is good.
I'm actually afraid to tell you that because then I'm afraid
you'll get carried away.
I'm nearly better telling you we're over to keep you in line.
It's all doable. Champagne!
Wait 'til the end Dermot.
A week later, an unusually tentative Dermot Bannon returns to Malahide.
I would say I was probably more nervous presenting this design
than I was presenting any other design for a long time.
The biggest problems here are your living spaces really are too small.
And they're quite disconnected.
But you've got this great garden which is really sunny
so it's got perfect aspect.
There's a lot riding on it.
It's not just about creating a great space.
It's not just about doing up a house.
This was about fundamentals of how you function in a house so it had to work.
The main concepts behind it are, if we start from this way, light and dark.
It's light at the back, it's dark to the front.
To give Michael the freedom he needs to get around,
I want to create a clear route through the house.
Reconfiguring and extending the rear will give an open plan living,
kitchen and dining, spread apart to give Michael space.
Demolishing the garage will create room for a utility and a store room.
The dining and living area will be surrounded by glass
opening onto a sensory terrace with a shallow reflecting pool
and planting to be experienced from both inside and out.
At the front of the house the old sitting room will transform
into a proper teenage bedroom for Michael, with a spacious
wheelchair-friendly en-suite.
Upstairs I'm going to sacrifice one of the existing spare bedrooms to
create a luxurious new walk-in wardrobe leading off
Ann and Barry's master bedroom.
Where the dining table is is going to focus out onto this pool
which is going to be a water pool so you're going to have a water feature
so you'll always have the trickle of water. You love water, don't you.
I love the way he's using the space outside as well as the space inside.
That was very important for us and he's really hit the nail
on the head with the outdoor spaces.
That brings our budget up to 130,364.
Bingo!
I think it'll be life changing. I think it will.
It'll make such a difference to how we work and how we live.
I'm really happy.
I'll be able to fit through doors easier than I can now.
So it'll be brilliant.
He's just so excited he's getting his own bedroom.
He's so excited he's getting his own bathroom.
That's made his day.
And made my day.
For the duration of this build, Ann, Barry and all their
belongings will decamp to rented accommodation.
With construction imminent, Ann has invited occupational therapist
Nicki Fitzpatrick to assess the layout and brief Dermot on
current guidelines regarding accessibility.
The bathroom is roughly designed to come from this wall
the whole way over here. So it's this space here.
It's really important to get the advice of somebody who's
in the business of designing rooms for people with disabilities.
The remainder of the room is here.
It's a very, very small, confined space.
Especially for somebody with a motorised wheelchair.
If you're thinking of all the bits and pieces that have to go into that room..
The bed, his chair, computer, desk, whatever a teenager will need,
it's just far too confined.
Okay, so this probably needs to grow a bit then.
Today was a bit of a curve ball.
Michael has been coming here for 4 years and up until now,
the space has been fine.
They're extending it and they're making the whole space much bigger
and it's suddenly not fine any more.
Increasing the size of Michael's en-suite bedroom in line with
Nicki's recommendations, means reducing the already modest
living and dining space that the three will share.
It also means demolishing an internal supporting wall at a cost of nearly 8,000 euro.
You can slip it in there and it sounds like nothing but
it's a huge amount extra.
The way I look at it is, it's for Michael's safety and
for his ease of access.
I'm aware that we're in a property that the space is confined and
you do have to compromise on these things but my job
is to be an advocate for Michael.
In order to make the bedroom as big as you possibly can,
it will compromise the living space somewhat.
The relaxing area is very important to him too.
He's talked about wanting a nice couch and maybe an armchair for himself.
There has to be space for that.
He's going to have so much space.
I don't think we can over-estimate how happy he's going to be.
He's off again!
Ah. I'm sorry.
You'll start me off.
I would hate that something that I designed, in 5 or 10
years time just didn't work and we had an opportunity to do
something about it when we were designing it.
You always live in fear of that.
So I want to get it right and I want to get it right now.
A few days later, builder Ian Hart and his crew are following what
they assumed were final drawings for Michael's en-suite
and the new kitchen and living space.
What Ian doesn't know is that the official guidelines have added
a whole new layer of complexity.
So you've started clearing out in here.
Yeah, floor is coming up. Doors gone, skirtings, architraves.
This room may change. I'll explain in a minute.
Normal day one.
Yeah. Here's Dermot, due in 30 minutes.
This size of Michael's bedroom may have to change.
Because of recommendations from the occupational therapist.
Right, okay.
Ian has started here on day one, enthusiastic and yet he actually
doesn't know what he's building. That's not a great start.
You need drawings by the end of the week.
The window manufacturers need drawings.
There is no drawings because there's no design at the moment.
The design is up in the air.
I came in here this morning and everything was going plain sailing.
It was all grand. No changes.
I thought this is too good to be true.
The lads are meant to be here onsite tomorrow morning.
I can tell them they've about a day's work here
and after that we're going to have to grind to a halt.
With the build on hold for the rest of the week,
Ann comes to see what's left of her house.
Oh my God.
Half of my house is gone.
Who dirtied my wooden floors!
Oh my God!
It's kind of a little sad too to see the poor house being whacked apart.
It's your fault. Yeah.
It's like the day that I've been imagining and dying to come
but there's been so much talk over the years,
I didn't actually really imagine the day coming.
I've been excited all day. I've been dying to get here.
How will Michael react to it?
I'd say he'll be absolutely gobsmacked.
I don't think he really has a real understanding of what this is going to look like.
Oh my God.
It seems so different.
What seems different?
The garage is gone. Oh my God!
I was dying to look at it. I'm so excited.
The oven is gone, the cooker, the glass,
the door.
Oh my God.
It looked old and there's loads of stuff on the floor.
Have to throw that away.
Hey Dermot. Hi Michael.
How are you? Good.
I heard a lot of oh my Gods. Are you a bit shocked? Yes.
The one person we haven't introduced you to yet is Ian
and this Ian and he's the builder.
How are you. Pleased to meet you.
Hi. You too.
IAN: I'm responsible for all this now. I'm sorry.
Lads, don't be.
Met Michael today and after all the.. I wouldn't say trauma.
His enthusiasm and his face, just lightened everything and
I'm going to look forward to moving on with this and getting it to
somewhere where he's going to enjoy.
It's given me light at the end of the tunnel to get through this.
We should be out of this hole by Friday.
That's what I'm hoping and this project will be back on track.
I can't believe I'm saying that on day one, that the project
will be back on track on day one.
It all feels a bit surreal.
But it's a problem, we need to deal with it
and just get on with it and hopefully the project
will run smoothly after that.
No, no, no, no, no.
I don't like anything about this.
It kind of threw open a can of worms.
I had to..
My ears there.
You're the only man in Ireland who doesn't want his own pool.
Anything could happen at this stage.
It's now 3 weeks into construction at Malahide.
Unhappy with the shade cast across the garden by a huge and
unfortunately diseased tree, Dermot and his clients have ordered its summary execution.
When I first moved in here I was so proud of buying my house and
I used to sit here and look out at the lovely big tree
and think this is fantastic.
I wouldn't have imagined doing anything with it then.
But 17 years is enough time.
High above, fearless arborist Eoin O'Connell is at work,
cutting the ailing oak down to size.
Oh my God.
That's amazing.
Actually it's a bigger impact that coming down,
than the day I saw the garage come down.
This changes the feel of the house completely.
It's just the best decision we've made so far.
With the words of the occupational therapist still ringing in their ears
and the looming prospect of an expensive re-design,
Dermot and Ann have come to Cork to glean advice from
Michael's wheelchair builder, Donal Buckley,
who lives with a condition similar to Michael's.
Myself, Ann and Barry had thought that the size of the bedroom
and the en-suite were sufficient.
So we want to gather as much information as we can before
we make a final call.
As his space, for his chair and his life in this house,
I wouldn't make it any bigger.
You have a space. It's up to Dermot to be clever in how to use it.
To guarantee the most efficient usable space for Michael,
Donal advises Dermot to take his lead from ship design.
I've lived in bedrooms smaller.
What I did was I built my bed a bit like a ship.
I had the bottom half for blankets, a middle bit for me and
the top was more shelves.
It didn't affect me.
I'm excited about the whole shipbuilding kind of thing.
It's one piece of fitted furniture that almost slots in.
The bed becomes the desk.
Beneath it we have drawers, above it storage.
I feel a weight has been lifted because there was that dilemma
with regard to of course, really good advice but
also the budget and the space and I do feel there's clarity and
I do feel very reassured that what we're going to do is
going to be really good for Michael.
On Donal's recommendation, Dermot and Ann travel on to Carrigaline
to meet Paul McCarty who's designed and built his own house
in bespoke wheelchair-friendly style.
The main kitchen sink here.
That's designed so that I can get right in under it.
The height as well.
We did use the official guidelines here.
We got hints off it.
How far a sink should be from a toilet and that kind of thing.
We said right, this is what they should be but we don't need
that size so we'll slim it down a bit and tweak it.
Some of the ramps we haven't even measured them but
I know that I can use them.
The TV is at a certain height that you can get at everything.
The other reason it's floating on the all is because if it's
on the floor, I'll bang straight into it.
The guidelines are there for the public most of the time.
Most of that is for a public building.
Yeah, a public building has to be right.
Your house is your home.
You build your own house to your own needs.
And you make a home. Yeah.
I think the guidelines are great for universal situations
and that's great for public buildings, for hospitals.
One thing I've taken away is everybody we've seen today
has designed for homes and for living in a home.
It seems to be a totally different kettle of fish.
Yeah, exactly.
Weighing Donal and Paul's advice against the prospect of spending
8,000 euro they just don't have, Dermot and his clients decide
to retain the structural wall.
All that now stands in the way of ordering patio doors and windows
is a consensus on the finish.
To everyone's surprise, including his own,
Barry has strong opinions.
We have enough money in the budget to do a hardwood window which
is something like this.
With the hardwood, you have to get a floor that works with it.
So you have to go for a dark floor.
It wasn't what I had pictured.
Barry had a bit of a reaction to the timber.
I don't know if he didn't like it or he just hadn't enough time to think about it.
It kind of threw open a can of worms.
I just felt the wood was..
I was quite surprised when Ann went yeah, that's it.
I was going oh no. That's definitely not what I'd pictured.
What kind of colour had you imagined they would be?
I'm not sure actually.
I would like you to make decisions about what you like and
have an input and have a say. Once it's what I want!
You've got until 11 o'clock tomorrow to pick these.
We'll go off and pretend I had some input into it and
we'll come back and tell you we want this one.
A week later, having agreed on the dark window frames Ann prefers,
Dermot and his clients are back onsite.
Top of the agenda is Dermot's proposed reflection pool,
about which Barry's had second thoughts.
You're the only man in Ireland who doesn't want his own pool.
It's just to be agreed.
But we do want a pool.
Yeah, I think possibly. I don't know.
It's a definite maybe.
It's possible.
My understanding is it's about 4 foot wide and 10 foot long.
I don't really get what the purpose of it is.
I'm not sure about it at all.
It's bringing water close to the house.
It's visual, it's tactile.
I think it'd be really important.
It'll make that courtyard an alive space as opposed to a dead space.
We'll revisit it I'm sure. Won't we?
I'm sure we will. We will.
I think it is something that we're still interested in.
Well one of you is anyway. The royal we.
Half of us are and the other half aren't really.
I'm not giving up on that.
I'll keep dropping it into every conversation bit by bit.
It's almost like a running joke now but slowly he'll just
one day, where's the reflecting pool.
Right now, Ian is rather more concerned with the prospect of
future drainage problems.
Beneath the site of the proposed extension, he's uncovered a drainage
soak away that will have to be relocated before anything can be built on top.
Easier said than done.
Essentially it's like a big tissue. We can't build over that.
We have to take out the whole lot and deal with it from the bottom up.
What it means now is we've no drainage for the drainwater.
We've nowhere for the rainwater from the roof of the existing house,
the roof of the extension and any of the paving..
We've nowhere for it to go.
It is something for an engineer to look at and tell us what to do.
Is there any chance of getting a soak away back here again?
< Yeah but it's all subject to test. We need to do a percolation test.
Digging a second soak away further down the garden will cost around 400 euro.
If that's not possible, a connection to the main drain at the front of
the house will cost five times as much.
If the soak away doesn't work, we're talking a couple of thousand.
If it's worked there, there's no reason it's not going to work over there?
In theory. In theory.
In the end the cheaper option got the go-ahead and thoughts
return to plumbing of a more refined sort.
A mobile stowable bath for Michael's new bathroom where space is at a premium.
Today he and Dermot are meeting furniture designer, Hugo Thompson.
Let's dive in.
Dive straight in and see what we have.
It needed to be something mobile and it needed to be something
at the right height.
There was quite a complicated brief for the bath.
It needs to be a piece of design.
It needs to be something that when you look at it,
you think it's really, really cool.
I heard that you're a big pop fan, Michael.
Yeah, One Direction. You like One Direction.
I have the boys here holding a surfboard.
I have the king of pop here.
We've got some beach buggies here. That's what I'm thinking of.
A bath beach buggy. That sounds cool.
I'm not a big fan of One Direction so I started looking them up and
their big song at the minute is called Kiss You.
There's the guys in the video on surfboards.
It's summertime.
Then I was thinking beach buggy bath would be perfect.
There's something chunky, iconic, design about it.
We're designing a piece here.
It's not a separate bath sitting on wheels.
He's combining the two into the one.
That's where the beach buggy came into it.
I think it was really, really clever.
We're going to be using the same production method that they use to
make surfboards so you're going to have your own kind of big surfboard.
Wow. Happy days.
As a designer myself, I know it's great to show somebody a concept
and give them the dream.
It's a totally different thing delivering it on a budget of about
1,500 euro, which isn't a huge amount to make a bespoke bath.
It's a challenge but it's a challenge I'm up for.
I'm really excited.
I can't wait until the whole thing is finished.
I can't wait. I'm so excited.
5 days later, Ann is back on site and our eager architect is still
pushing for a decision on the pool.
When you're sitting here, you'll have your table and chairs here.
You'll have some amazing colour over here.
Then we have the reflection pool here.
It all comes together like a plan.
It's actually one thing you do need to tie down now because
you might need mini diggers in here.
This time next week the windows will be in.
We are not going to get a mini digger through the sitting room,
out through the lovely new double doors and into the garden.
Any work that needs to be done in the garden needs to be done now.
I think it'd be great to bring the terrace..
I'd bring it at least out to here.
With or without the pool, Dermot has big plans for this outside space.
And they're getting bigger all the time.
There's no point in having furniture out there,
BBQ's and sun loungers, if Michael can't get around it.
I need it to be big enough that it's going to be a really useful
space for Ann, Barry and Michael.
The bigger we can afford to do this, the better.
Patricia's the only person who can advise on that.
We still have 1,700 left in the contingency so I'm just conscious
that it's still very early days. I don't want that spent.
I'm conscious that the design for the outdoor area is now changing
and we only have a week before that work needs to be done so
we need a design and we need a cost.
The budget is tight on this project so I don't know how much we've
left in for the garden.
What do you think we can do?
We would've put in 17 square metres of patio at the back.
If we were to increase that from 17 to maybe 25.
Or even 4 by.. Somebody do 4 into 25.
Six fours are 24. No they're not. Are they?
How do you know this?
I don't know.
< It's common knowledge!
It kind of scares me when I see Dermot doing the Maths.
It's not his forte and I think he should leave it to the experts.
4 by 8. That's 24.
You want 8 long now? No. 4 by 6.
Oh no sums!
I worry a little but then I don't think anyone takes him seriously
when he starts to do the maths.
So you're talking 320 needs to be found if you want to go out that far. Yeah.
We should plot out 6 metres now, see if it's enough.
Honestly, I'd prefer to lose the reflecting pool to give you more space there.
I think that's more important to you. This would be great.
I nearly fell out of my standing because I'm sure I heard Dermot say
maybe if the reflection pool went we'd have the money for the patio.
My ears there for a minute.
The reflection pool's gone.
He said no, no, no. That's not what I said.
No pond now. You're going to extend out there?
That's not.. No, no, no, no, no.
The whole building is orientated around this pool.
300 days of the year it rains in this country and that's what
you want to be looking out on.
A feature in your garden not extended terrace.
This space for you, is incredibly important.
Your needs are just as important as mine in this build.
Are they! Thanks very much!
That's nice to hear.
Little white lie. I'm not prepared to lose that.
A messy building site is no place to extol the virtues of a
reflection pool so Dermot, Ann and Barry arrange a meeting with
landscape gardener, Peter O'Brien, in the cleaner, greener environs
of Wicklow's National Garden Exhibition Centre.
What my plan for the garden is, is senses.
It's something that you can hear, you can see, you can smell.
So I needed to immerse them in a space that has lots and lots of gardens.
This is something that I found.
It doesn't need to be any bigger than this.
I think if we've something like this and jungle plants the whole way around it,
the courtyard becomes something more than just a dead space between two buildings.
I'm just looking at this and I'm not gone on this.
I'm not gone on it.
It certainly wasn't something that I would've ever pictured.
Nor me. Different strokes for different folks but
it's certainly not something I'd like.
It didn't appeal to the vision we were having of tranquillity and
jungle and all of those things.
What don't we like? Give me the list.
Don't like the tubular bells. Okay.
Don't like the big rocks. Okay.
I don't like anything about this other than the sound and the water.
Nothing else.
What they did come round to was the fact that there's going to be water.
He didn't like the sculpture in the middle. That doesn't bother me.
We have water now.
Satisfied that he knows what Barry wants, Dermot will now have to
deal with landscape gardener Peter's more practical concerns
about the planting budget.
I think we have about 1,000 euro for planting.
That's a bit tight.
If you're going to be looking out at this garden,
planting is the main thing.
But how much do we need for planting?
You could double that at least.
Maybe I was a bit naive.
Some of the plants we're looking at, that's 200 quid that's 200 quid.
You've got 5 plants.
We still have a big area, 30 square metres to fill with plants.
If we blow our budget on five individual plants that
are going to take up about that much space, that worries me a little bit.
We want water and we want sound. How about a tap!
Right now to me, the reflection pool is totally imaginary.
It's a sound in Dermot's head.
Am I missing a trick here?
No-one pisses on my chips.
I don't think that's fair and Ann and Barry.
Maybe I'm losing the plot.
The focus has switched to the garden.
Planting is crucial to Dermot's design but in the aftermath of a
financial rethink at the garden centre, he's found a way to economise.
It's called theft.
I'm looking around here and I'm thinking we've got trees,
we've got shrubs, we've got planting. It's already there.
Why not use it?
A lot of those are coming in from the neighbour's side.
That means they're free. No, it doesn't work that way.
We're borrowing from next door. Not really.
If the neighbours decide to just cut everything back, then you've nothing.
That's what I do.
You get a project with a limited amount of money.
The first thing that you do is you look around you and you see what
have you got already here that's great.
To ask us to leave neighbour's plants because it's going enhance
the garden, I don't think that's fair on Ann and Barry.
I think we really should be starting fresh in the garden,
cutting everything back.
If we take away an awful lot of the shrubs and plants that are around us
we'll be left with nothing.
As soon as we cut them back we're into a fence?
You have to put something else up. So it's more money.
I think that costing should've been done at the start.
We didn't have a design. Well there you go.
Money is tight. If only there was a pool to dip into!
Do you think the 2,000 it's costing for the water feature,
we could do most of the back garden with that?
We could do a good chunk of it.
If anybody needs money for anything, let's go to the pool and we'll take it out.
It's like it's currency here. It's our savings account.
I'd definitely like to know if Ann and Barry are 100% on it
because it is a big chunk of cash.
We're going to lose a water feature so that we can chop down all the
greenery that's here, to add in more greenery that looks slightly better.
Maybe I'm losing the plot.
Right now to me, the reflection pool is totally imaginary.
It's a sound in Dermot's head.
He's hearing it, he's seeing it. No-one else is.
At this stage I'm sick of hearing about it.
But I have nothing for it so something needs to happen.
As three huge glazed panels are installed at the rear of the house,
a clear leader emerges in the race between construction and design.
It weighs 2 and a half tonnes and it's parked out the back.
There was big discussion the last time about the garden getting
finished before these windows came in.
We're ready. We even got our digger in ready to do it but
there's been no decisions, there's no plans, there's nothing yet.
You see the digger out there, idle.
But how are you going to get that out now?
This is it. I'll have to get it back out through a window.
Will it go over the thresholds without damaging them?
I don't know.
You can't damage the doors because if the doors don't slide really easily,
we'll have to.. Sue me.
I've no detail on your pool here. What's going on there?
That's kind of urgent then. Absolutely, yeah.
It was urgent 2 weeks ago.
Don't spoil it all.
You've an awful habit if doing that.
Drawings come when drawings come.
No-one pisses on my chips.
Normally you've got the roof on, windows in and then it's
plain sailing from there on. Not on this project.
It's from here on we have a big challenge.
We need lots and lots of floor space in this house but yet,
we still need the house to do everything else that a regular house does.
Even with its new extension and terrace, Ann and Barry's
house is still modestly sized.
What it lacks in space however, Dermot intends to make up with innovation and ergonomic design,
inspired by a visit to MGM Boats in Dun Laoghaire.
Welcome onboard. Thank you.
A little bit of died and gone to heaven.
Wow. Give me a tour, will you? Yeah. Come on.
She's got twin inboard engines. What does that mean?
The real reason I'm here today was to see how ingenuity, form,
function, all of that..
Like this is actually architecture.
This is the best of design.
Do you see this Michael? Yes.
You know the way you like the idea of a desk
with a little hidden place underneath it. Yeah.
Take all your pens out. Do you like that?
Yes. Fancy dancy. Fancy dancy.
That's basically the front door where I walked down.
From there you've got two sitting rooms, two dining rooms,
a kitchen with an island unit, storage underneath, storage overhead.
You've got a TV that pops up, a navigation centre and
we've literally gone 5 steps.
And none of it feels cramped.
What's really inspiring about a day like today is it's all the little
nooks and crannies, little spaces where you can slot things in.
They're going to make life so much easier for Michael.
This is the kind of thing where we need to learn how to design Michael's bedroom.
You're not going to see how to design Michael's bedroom in any other house.
It's on somewhere like this.
Will we get the captain to turn on the engines and get going? Yes.
Do you want to shout Captain? Captain!
Captain Ross! We want to get going!
Michael, France is that way.
Now turn us back the other way.
It's not left and right on a boat.
It's called port.. And starboard.
Which is which? Yeah!
Well done Michael. You're doing great.
A little bit more to your starboard. Perfect.
Way back we spoke to Donal in Cork and he talked about Michael's bedroom.
Being a small space, he compared it to how a boat builder might design
a cabin in a yacht and to see the really sleek lines and
to see everything really so neat and tucked away.
We got some really nice ideas.
A week later back on dry land, Dermot calls a meeting with Ann
and cabinetmakers, Francis and Ciaran.
The plan is to channel all that sea-going inspiration into
bespoke space-saving furnishings for Michael's bedroom.
This is not a luxury.
Michael can't operate in a regular bedroom.
There's no point in us going out and buying a bed and lockers and a desk.
It's useless to him.
We can't just put regular furniture in. It has to be hand-made.
If we're going to hand-make it, it has to be really nice.
It's just the fact that currently there's a lot of things he can't access.
He spends his life knowing there's things he can't access.
I talked to him a little bit about the bedroom today and
the first thing he said was will I be able to plug in my phone.
I said yeah. He went no really, you're joking me.
I say really. He said you mean right beside me?
The wardrobe isn't a wardrobe in general terms.
It'll be a drive in wardrobe for Michael.
The more you talk, the more you're adding to that budget.
As I breathe it costs money.
I've worked with these guys before.
I know that they can make really beautiful things out of nothing.
That's the challenge that I've set for them today.
The workmanship and just watching every detail.
I think we can do something good here.
I just hope we can keep it under budget.
He wants to best but he wants it for nothing.
For the last 6 weeks, designer Hugo Thompson has been hard at work
creating Michael's dream bath tub.
Look at this.
What do you think? It looks fantastic.
It looks really, really cool.
You've taken almost every curve out of it and you've replaced it
with facets and angles. It's brilliant.
But you've managed to just push it that little bit further
and make it into a piece of sculpture.
That's what makes it so beautiful.
That's what makes a beautiful chair.
It's things that you need and you work with every single day.
But they don't have to be ordinary.
Michael is going to love this. I love it.
I hope he does.
I really hope he does.
I'm not a person for rushing design at the end.
I'm not great at deadlines but we have to finish this in 5 days.
Can you do it? I guess I'm going to have to.
Inspired by the efforts of the various artisans contributing to the
final finish, even Dermot has coaxed out his inner Michelangelo.
Wacky races here today. It's bedlam.
Boxes everywhere, people everywhere.
And Dermot shows up with a sculpture.
I want to put various size discs up onto the wall.
Then they all have to be painted different colours.
The whole house has been about the senses.
It's like bubbles floating through the air.
It's colourful. Something that looks random but isn't random.
You've designed this? Yes.
This isn't a copy? No.
It's totally random, made up.. It's not random. It's thought out.
Thought out random.
It's my first time ever making something like this.
I love all this and I appreciate it and I understand it.
That doesn't mean I can do it.
My biggest fear is that it just looks arbitrary but it's not.
There's a lot of thought went into it.
A lot of thought went into picking every exact colour
and it should all work together.
After 14 weeks, a tiny semi-D has been transformed into
the most welcoming wheelchair-friendly home in Malahide.
The new extension and patio offer a seamless link
between the house and garden.
Inside, the combination of open plan accessibility and
comfortable family space is just as seamless.
This is a great project because it had kind of two parallel
briefs going at the one time.
First and foremost, it was bringing this house bang up to date for Ann and Barry.
That was the premise of the project but it was also about Michael.
It was about making the house function for Michael.
As an architect, you are equally challenged, equally excited with
smaller spaces that have to work much harder.
That's a real challenge.
Where you've got endless finances or endless space,
that's kinda easy to do. This is where it's much harder.
This is where it's a bigger challenge and this is where
when it works out, you really enjoy the results a hell of a lot more.
This is like the house you walk into and you wish that you lived in it.
We don't need to do anything else except enjoy it.
We've ended up with a house that we absolutely love.
I'm just over the moon.
It's definitely beyond my expectations.
There's a lovely feeling in this house.
It feels just very restful.
I do think it's going to change our lives.
The key to this house was to do it simply but to make
it work really, really hard.
So by just putting a box on it and leaving a space,
that immediately brought the garden to the dining room.
It immediately brought light to the dining room and it brought sound.
Well Barry, it's in. Here we are.
Reflecting pool. It's much smaller than I had ever intended it to be
but I still think it works.
Do you like the sound of the trickle? Does it relax you?
Oh it really relaxes me.
Do you feel serenity? Absolutely.
I always wanted something but just not on the scale that you wanted initially.
He still feels that he got exactly what he wanted.
If you think you've won, fair play to you.
Oh that is not..
Not I think I've won. Do you not think I've won?
We know you haven't won.
We've got a tiny water feature.
Barry, we have a water feature. I've won.
He still thinks he won. Whatever.
Today is the first day that Michael is going to see it.
I couldn't sleep last night with the excitement.
I can't wait to see what he thinks. I'm nervous obviously.
What happens if he does turn around and say I don't like?
Hello Michael!
Hello.
Come in.
Perfect.
Do you want to see your room first? Yes.
Oh my God.
It's amazing.
Do you recognise any clothes over there?
Yes, my tops.
Do you think you'll be able to drive in and get them yourself? Yes.
Can you reach? Yep.
Easy.
The main thing is hanging them back up again.
What do you think is up there? My bed?
Do you want to raise your chair up and have a look?
I'm glad that I have all the space to myself.
So I can just say sometime I can just go into my bedroom, shut the door.
I'll be like Ann and Barry, I'm going into my bedroom for a while.
Look over here.
Your own sockets to plug in your phone.
And a little shelf to put your things.
He has everything that every bedroom should have but
everything has just been designed and worked and put together
like a jigsaw and then built into the wall on both sides,
to leave the floor free.
Do you want to see the bathroom? Yes.
Your bath is pretty cool.
Will we go in and have a look? Yeah.
Wow!
See the shower up there.
So we turn that on and we put it in there and we fill it up
with piping hot water. Oh yeah!
Michael's Bathmobile.
It's easy to go under stuff and there was a lot of space
to get into my bathroom and my bedroom.
So I'm happy that there's that space and I can get under stuff.
It's all very cool.
Dermot again came up trumps with the small but really
important design features.
The devil is in the detail.
Oh my God.
Getting a dining room table custom made because it was
very hard when we went shopping and the tables were all far too thick.
Michael would bang his feet off it and he gets very frustrated.
It's not fair, I can't get in under this table.
There.
Is that good? Yeah.
Dermot didn't overlook anything.
Oh my God.
Isn't that cool. Yeah.
Imagine sitting eating your breakfast, listening to that trickling away.
Isn't the planting lovely. Yeah, it is actually.
Can you get the whole way around?
Remember you could hardly get out the door the last time.
No, I couldn't.
The best bit is you don't have to go back in the door.
So if I open this, you can go straight back into the sitting room.
Let's try it.
Cool. We're back in the sitting room again.
I think he did a great job of the whole house.
Well done Dermot.
Just fantastic to get here tonight and to know that
we were given a budget of 130,000. We're bang on budget.
We've achieved everything we wanted to achieve which
I suppose is just a reward in itself.
You're walking in here, it's just a reminder of what it's all about and what we do.
Build houses for people, getting people back into their houses,
into a house they love. And I think we've achieved that.
The garden looks fantastic.
Yeah, it's a great job. I think it's worked out very well.
Pushing the boat out and just doing it properly, doing it once,
it's really made a difference.
So well done. Thanks very much.
To walk in and the first person I see when I walk in the door,
I look to Michael's room and I see Michael in the centre
of the room, enjoying it. You could see it in him.
This is my space. This is my room.
This was done for me. That is just so special.
Big cheers for Ann, Barry and Michael.
ALL: Cheers. Cheers!
I can't wait to sleep tonight in my brand new bed
and my bedroom. It's going to be great.
Can't wait.
The real challenge here was having to listen, to learn
and then to make a relatively small space work to suit
Ann, Barry and Michael's needs.
I think I've got it to function.
But I hope I've given them a little bit more than that.
It has made a big difference.
It's easier than it was before.
I can't get everything so I don't have to ask Ann and Barry for help.
I can just do it on my own.
There you go. Thanks very much.
It is life-changing, especially when it comes to Michael.
He's 12 years of age. He's going to be a teenager in the next few months.
I think that it's so important for himself.
Is that to your requirements?
Is that the way you like it? Yes.
Somebody has only got a disability because the environment around
them isn't suited to their needs.
Once the environment is changed and the environment suits their needs,
there isn't a problem any more.
It's all perfect for me now.
Wow. This doesn't look like a bungalow.
I don't want any more wow. I have enough wow in this house.
Maybe he got a bit carried away with his raising the roof
and his big high windows.
I think it's very much he's on his journey and he hasn't
taken onboard my feelings.
This is a self build. Self.
I'm delighted with the amount of thought you're putting into it now.
I'm just sorry that it is 4 or 5 months too late.
: Tracey Carr, RTE 2015.