Lloyd Pingree
Grand Designs viewers have branded a couple who spent £150,000 building an eco-home which they could be kicked out of after five years ‘unhinged’.
Wednesday’s episode of the Channel 4 show, which follows Britain’s most ambitious self building projects, saw Marcus and Abi pursue their dream of building a family home on a 20-acre plot of woodland purchased by Marcus’s late father more than 30 years ago.
The married couple, who lived in the Pembrokeshire seaside town of Tenby with their 14-year-old twin daughters, were granted rare permission to build a house in the woods through the One Planet Development scheme specific to Wales.
Permission was granted on the basis that the family would live a low carbon life and provide proof of their ecological living for five years – or risk being ‘chucked off.’
Speaking to host Kevin McCloud, Marcus explained that someone from the organisation ‘scrutinises every part of our living from how we’re going to buy clothes in the future to what food we’re growing, what food we’re eating.’
‘It’s about the whole land management,’ Abi added. ‘You’re monitored for the first five years and you have to show that you have reduced your transport miles.’
When Kevin, who was visibly shocked by the requirement to produce five years’ worth of personal accounts, asked what happens if ‘you fail’, Abi replied: ‘You get chucked off.’
Viewers of the show were equally stunned, with one person saying the couple must be ‘unhinged’ and ‘mad’.
Taking to X, one wrote: ‘Is it a requirement now of Grand Designs people to be slightly unhinged/mad/naive? Who would spend £100,000 building a home that has absolutely no future guarantee.’
Marcus added that they ‘can never sell’ the property, which was initially costed at £100,000 but ran to £150,000, due to the nature of the planning permission obtained through the special policy.
It was the fact that the family could be either forced to leave their new home or stuck with it forever that proved astonishing for some viewers.
Marcus and Abi used only sustainable materials for the building, including timber from trees at risk of disease with recycled windows, second-hand glazing and even recycled newspapers for insulation.
Another person implied Marcus and Abi were terribly shortsighted, adding: ‘I do like it but I wonder what it’ll be like in five or 10 years during a storm when the first shingles need replacing.’
Others, however, labelled the couple ‘selfish’ on account of their decision to relocate their 14-year-old twin daughters to such a remote woodland location.
One person said: ‘Anyone think this couple on Grand Designs are selfish? Their kids [are] clearly not happy to love there and the house can’t be left to them.’
Another person agreed: ‘A playground for parents. For the children it’s isolation.’
A third commented: ‘Teenagers clearly gutted to live away from all their mates’.
While a fourth didn’t hold back when they said: ‘It may be the good life for the parents but I suspect the kids will not want to spend their main adult years, apart from an occasional holiday, there. Only practical for a tiny percentage of the population – just a fantasy really.’
A fifth added: ‘Children sound depressed, they’ll probably need therapy later in life.’
Indeed, even Marcus opened up about ‘a big fear that the 14-year-old girls just wanted to live in a house like everybody else’.
He even conceded that the youngsters would probably prefer to be staying where they were in Tenby.
The criticism didn’t stop there, however. Rather, some viewers were quick to question the eco-credentials of the whole project on the basis that Marcus and Abi intended to keep their previous seaside home and rent it out for income.
One person asked: ‘Grand Designs, do the eco-credentials fall down a bit if you have a second home?’
While a second was sceptical about the One Planet Development scheme itself, subtly suggesting it may not stack up. They added: ‘One Planet: chop some trees to build an eco-home whilst renting your bricks and mortar house as a holiday let. Hmmm…’
Marcus, who built the home largely without professional help, had been inspired to build in the woodland by his father, Paul, a pioneering environmentalist who bought the land more than 30 years ago.
Tragically, he passed away at the age of 54, with Marcus seeking to build a property there in his memory.
He and Abi, head of strategic communications at a renewable trade organisation, were living in the seaside town of Tenby with their twin daughters, renting it out each summer to live in an off-grid cabin in the woods.
Their unique deal with One Planet Development meant that they didn’t need detailed plans to build their new home and, to Kevin’s shock, didn’t have anything drawn up by an architect at all.
The structure of the property was complex to fit the environmental brief, consisting of 27 pits filled with recycled concrete and topped with a boulder for low-impact foundations.
Marcus and Abi used only sustainable materials for the building, including timber from trees at risk of disease with recycled windows, second-hand glazing and even recycled newspapers for insulation.
Powered by gravity, it would sit on the hillside in the shape of two caravan structures.
Jane Davidson, the Welsh cabinet minister for planning, told Kevin that around 50 homes had been through the One Planet Development policy.
She said: ‘The way we live now is actually under threat. These people are actually the most extraordinary pioneers.’
A laid-back Marcus told Kevin he ‘didn’t know’ if he could get insurance for it, had picked their £100,000 budget ‘out of the air’ and had discovered his charring timbers technique to prevent decay ‘on YouTube’.
Unimpressed, Kevin summarised: ‘If I’m right, you are spending £100,000 on something that you hope you can live in for the rest of your days but you’re not sure about.
‘You might get kicked out of it, and it’s going to be essentially worthless.’
Abi joked: ‘It’s a good investment isn’t it.’
The couple came up against a number of issues throughout the project, partly due to their tight budget, and Marcus admitted: ‘Money’s a worry. There’s going to be loads of other expenses I haven’t even thought about. I don’t want to get into massive debts paying it off.’
There also seemed to be tension with Abi as Marcus refused to fill out her costing spreadsheet.
Abi said: ‘I think Marcus’s idea of a budget is just to spend as little as possible. That’s not how budgets work. We have a little bit of tension about that.’
A rainy winter led to further delays while a composting toilet from Sweden that cost £2,000 took weeks to arrive and stretched the already tight budget to its limit.
‘I’m just working all hours at the moment. I’m shattered,’ Marcus admitted, as pressure grew to complete the project with time on their rental coming to an end.
Still, once complete, the house was lauded by host Kevin, who called it ‘a truly modern sustainable home’ and said Marcus and Abi had forged a new path for other people to follow.
He praised the property as ‘pretty flawless’, adding that it captured ‘the spirit of adventure with which it was built.’
The new series of Grand Designs airs on Channel 4 at 9pm on Wednesdays.
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