This is still the most important thing to know when designing your home.

And it’s the first decision to consider for your future home as well.

Knowing this for your project, whether you’re renovating or building new, will simplify all your further design decisions.

Hello! This is Episode 219, and I’m back!! 

Thank you for joining me again after the break we’ve had. I’m really excited to be here and spending this time with you, and looking forward to some awesome episodes that we have coming up.

This episode marks the beginning of my 5th birthday celebration for the “Get it Right” podcast.

Can you believe it? The podcast is 5 years old! That’s right: As of the 6th of December, 2021, the podcast has been going for 5 years. In that time, we’ve published 219 episodes (including this one), it’s been listened to in over 190 countries, and it’s been downloaded almost 1.2 Million times. 

So, for the next series of episodes, we’re going to be celebrating 5 years of the podcast by rebooting some of the old favourites, and interspersing them with great updates and extra information for you. 

I know it’s going to be great to revisit some of the most listened to episodes, and also do that alongside adding some super helpful extra knowledge and resources for designing, building and renovating your home.

In this episode, I’ll be sharing info on what is THE MOST downloaded episode from the entire 5 years of the podcast.

I actually love that this episode has been listened to so much, because this knowledge has the power to not only transform your home design and the experience of living in your home – but designing this way will also transform the impact our homes have on the planet too.

If you receive my newsletter, you’ll have seen me share a photo of how the podcast began. Me, sitting on the floor of our walk-in-robe, with my laptop and microphone on a small stool, and me speaking into the clothes for acoustic benefit.

My recording equipment is definitely better now, but my technique is still fairly rudimentary. I do dream of having a proper podcasting studio setup one day, but for now, it’s still me, my laptop, a much nicer microphone than those early years, and occasionally a doona over my head if I am finding the acoustics particularly challenging!

However, what has never changed, is my passion and commitment to bring you fantastic, freely available information to improve your experience as you design, build and renovate your family home, to help you improve your home design and the outcome you create, and ultimately to help you to – like the podcast is aptly called – “Get it Right”. 

The podcast now has hundreds and hundreds of reviews, so a huge thank you if you’ve taken the time to leave a review, because it really does make a difference and help the podcast be seen by those who need it. Currently, this podcast is the highest ranked, and highest rated, Australian Design podcast, which is thanks to you, listening each week, and leaving your kind feedback.

Alright – let’s dive into this first episode in our 5th Birthday Celebratory Reboot, with an episode from the first year of the podcast.

This episode was the first episode of Season 1, which kicked off on December 13, 2016. Wow, doesn’t that feel like a lifetime ago with everything we’ve all been through in the last five years?

Season 1 is called “What Matters Most”. And I remember that when I was shaping the early content of the podcast, I really wanted to help you figure out what the best and most important decisions were going to be upfront, so that would simplify your path and progress moving forward.

This Season 1 of the podcast is a great start in understanding more about orientation and how to factor it into your design. Here’s a list of the episodes (which you can also find on this page with the Season index)

• Episode 01 >>> The most important thing to know when designing your home
• Episode 02 >>> Making your home great: All things NORTH
• Episode 03 >>> Making your home great: All things EAST
• Episode 04 >>> Making your home great: All things SOUTH
• Episode 05 >>> Making your home great: All things WEST
• Episode 06 >>> Online resources to help with important design choices
• Episode 07 >>> The assets that add design value for free
• Episode 08 >>> Creating Spaciousness: Using Volume
• Episode 09 >>> Creating Spaciousness: Using Light
• Episode 10 >>> Creating Spaciousness: Great Storage
• Episode 11 >>> Creating Spaciousness: Indoor Outdoor Connections

My experience at that point had been that I’d met so many homeowners who were overwhelmed with all the choices they had to make with their project, and thought that designing a great and sustainable home was just going to be more expensive – and even cost prohibitive. 

And yet, they didn’t have this fundamental knowledge about how to design to suit their site, and its natural assets, all of which are available for free and can make such a massive difference to how your home feels and functions, when you design with them in mind.

I firmly believe that great design isn’t any more expensive than terrible design.

As a client said to me many years ago – it costs the same to build the wall whether you put it in the right place or the wrong place. 

But achieving great design means understanding some foundational design principles, and then prioritising them in your design process. That actually makes the design process much simpler, because it cuts out SO many options at the outset – which then reduces the number of available choices to make.

If this is the first time you’re hearing this rebooted episode, it’ll be great as an introduction to this topic. And if you’re a regular listener and have heard it before, it’s going to give you a great refresher on what matters most when designing your future new home or renovation. 

The most downloaded episode on the Get it Right podcast is titled “The most important thing to know when designing your home.”

And guess what … after running Undercover Architect for 7.5 years, and being in the business of home design for over 27 years – this is STILL the most important thing to know when designing your home. Not your budget. Not who will do your design. But this.

Listen to the episode now.

RESOURCES:

Other podcast links I mentioned:

Check out the full Season 1 of the podcast “What Matters Most”. The full index of episodes are here >>> SEASON 1

Other resources:

Access the support and guidance you need to be confident and empowered when renovating and building your family home inside my flagship online program >>> HOME METHOD

Learn more about how to get started with your home design with the Happy Home Design mini-course >>> HAPPY HOME DESIGN

Access my free online workshop “Your Project Plan” >>> FREE WORKSHOP