Site survey and layout marking

Once the base design was finalised, the first work on the ground was not marking lines — it was clearing what was already there.

Removing the old structure

A small storage room stood on the plot with no place in the new plan. Built in cement and concrete, it could not simply be abandoned: the debris would need to be used carefully as fill in the foundation work ahead.

The structure was dismantled by hand. Reusable materials — tin sheets, angles, and anything else worth keeping — were set aside. What remained was broken down deliberately rather than bulldozed away, so nothing useful left the site unnecessarily.

Line-out and pivot marking

With the plot cleared, the building footprint was transferred from drawing to earth. Line-out was taken, pivot points were marked, and reference stakes went in at the corners and junctions of the plan.

This is the moment when an abstract design becomes a physical presence on the land — before walls, before stone, before lime mortar. Every later phase depends on these first marks being true.

What we carried forward

• Debris from the old structure reserved for foundation filling rather than hauled away
• Reusable materials salvaged during demolition
• A marked footprint verified against the plan before excavation began

The full phase timeline is on the Progress page.