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Chronicles of the Design & Construction of Two Waterfront Hurricane Proof Dry Stack Modular Green Custom Homes
1. Villa Lagoon, Wilder Italian Style Home
2. Nasello Italian Style Home

Mary and Jerry Nasello's Gulf Coast DAC-ART Waterfront House Construction: 2006-2009
Site Prep	Pilings	Foundation	1st Course	Slab Prep	Slab	2nd Course	3rd Course	4th Course	5th Course	Page 11
6th Course	First Floor	7th Course	Porch#1	8th-9th row blocks	Weathershield	10,11,12th	Second Floor	16th Row blocks	17,18,19th row	19,20th row
Page 22	Cornice	Fireplace	Roof-1	Roof-2	Roof-3	Cornice-2	Arches	Garage Doors	Porch Arches	Roof Decking
Page 33	Tile Roof		Newspaper: Castle Article			Magazine Coverage: DacArt in the News				FloorTile
Product Discussion Pages
Partners	DacArt in the News	Buy a Finished DAC-ART Home	Tankless Water Heaters	Magnesium Oxide Boards-MgO	Concrete Bldg. Systems and History	Hurricane Windows & Doors	Custom Garage Doors	Composite Decking	House Numbers	Concrete Floor Tile and Reproduction

First Course of DAC-ART Dry Stack Hollow Concrete Blocks

This is our first load of blocks that our house is going to be made from. Quality control was assured by the manufacturer, so we accepted delivery without inspecting the blocks. We later determined that some of the blocks were too big and some were too small. Some were suppose to have electrical boxes pre-cast from the factory but they were not. 

The long blocks weigh over 1000 lbs. and must be lifted and positioned by very heavy equipment. We used a Lull initially and later switched to a crane as the height of the house increased.

We had to put small plastic spacers (shims) underneath the blocks to make sure that there is a place for grout and to assist in leveling the blocks. When the backfill concrete is poured into the block's interiors there is a lot of pressure. You have to make sure that the grout that goes in the space between the blocks is good and hard to prevent any seepage between the blocks. Also, with a house this tall, we have to be really mindful of keeping things level since if we were off level at all, the error would be multiplied as we go higher. 

The above photo shows the small plastic shims that are used to level the DAC-ART man-made stone blocks.

We are installing the first course of blocks before pouring the slab. The blocks themselves will serve as our form to hold the slab in place during pouring. The slab is 8 inches thick and reinforced with very thick rebar. This is to allow heavy equipment to be driven onto the slab during construction. We had to block the openings for both the functional garage doors and the fake ones on the other wall during the pour.

People often wonder what the cost of DACART Blocks is. For this house the cost of the blocks alone is approximately $238,000.

Photos by Jerry Nasello

Villa Lagoon Tile

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Original Website Villa Lagoon Phase I completed in 2003 See the construction process of Phase I.		New Website-2007-2009 Phase II North Elevation w/ Frieze Construction of Phase II on this site.