Designing your own home gives you a chance to rethink old assumptions. Do I really need this? Can I do without that? Wouldn’t it be great if...? Dare to be original! You might be surprised and delighted at what you come up with. If an idea doesn’t work, that’s O.K. Throw it out.

When you question your assumptions you put aside, for a moment, your currently held beliefs and consider the alternatives. It's scary at first, but when you realize you can always go back to your old assumption, the exercise can be very interesting.

When we designed our latest new home, we began this exercise with some trepidation. One of the assumptions we questioned was the need for a guest room. First we thought we should combine the guest room with our office spaces. After much brainstorming we decided to add a sleeping loft above each of our offices and use the lofts for guest sleeping. If, for whatever reason, the lofts aren't appropriate for a future guest, we'll put them up in a nearby hotel. The money saved by not having a dedicated guest room will save us many times the cost of hotel room fees.

As we got more practice at questioning our assumptions, we became more daring and soon we were questioning everything! We found that, once we put an assumption through the paces, we either became more committed to it or decided that there was really no reason to hold on to it any longer. We then modified the assumption to better fit the lifestyle we are seeking. One of our favorite lines became, "Then again, the opposite could be true!"

Here's another real life example:
Assumption: We need a dishwasher.
• Then again the opposite could be true. We don't cook at home as much as we did when the kids were here, and the dishes we do use could easily be hand washed at the end of every day.
• Yes, but aren't dishwashers more energy efficient?
(we researched dishwasher efficiency) Turns out that if you conserve water while hand washing dishes by waiting to rinse several at a time and turning off the water when you're not rinsing, hand washing is actually the most energy efficient.
• BUT, we also plan to have custom hardwood cabinets in our kitchen (yes we questioned that one too). The cost of custom cabinetry that would replace the dishwasher is about the same price, so there is no cost savings by not having one.
Result: We decided to have a dishwasher after all, but to hand wash dishes whenever possible. We chose a Fisher/Paykel dish drawer (see photo) that is smaller than conventional dishwashers and much more energy efficient. (We love it.)

Without taking the risk to question the assumptions that are the underpinnings of a lot of our long held beliefs, we probably wouldn't have even thought to consider a new perspective. When going into a new home project, agree to question every assumption that you currently hold. The results might surprise you!

If you are downsizing, physics will tell you that you're going to have to pare down your belongings. How does one begin? Follow the "stuff assessment" link to find out.