Visiting Braestone

It's been a while since we've posted any updates on how the home plans are coming along - sorry guys! It's been so busy!

Last weekend we visited a homebuilder and community in Horseshoe Valley, ON named Braestone. After speaking with one of the representatives of James Hardie product at a Home Show here in Peterborough, we learned that Braestone was one of the only communities in Ontario to use the Arctic White Hardie LapSiding. We just had to go see it for ourselves.

We contacted Braestone, and spoke with a salesman who advised us that they had over 100 homes build with Hardie product, and over ten of them were white with different coloured trim packages.

The drive to Horseshoe Valley was about 2 hours with a couple of eventful pit stops along the way, but we made it in good time. When you pull onto Braestone you pass an old farmhouse that has been completely redone in Hardie product. It looks incredible, and it's occupied by one of the Braestone builders. Photos can't do this community justice. The homes are all on estate size lots, and they've all got beautiful views. The community was actually voted "Best New Home Community in Canada" in 2016 by the Canadian Home Builders Association. And you can sure see why! Not only are the homes beautiful, but the community has so much to offer. If you're ever in the area I would recommend to check them out. They've got things like a Christmas tree farm, skating pond, a berry patch, apple orchard, a vineyard, and a 'field of dreams' private ball diamond just to name a few. Lets just say if we lived in this area, Braestone would be a community we would want to be part of!

Even though Braestone is still a construction zone, the homes really stood out. The Hardie product popped with colour, the front porches occupied the whole front of the homes, the upper windows all had gables and / or shed roof style dormers, and most garages were two level or high peak, and had a very country feel to them. This was a 'modern farmhouse' heaven.

We drove through the subdivision to check out all of the colour combinations they had used, and it's no surprise that the Arctic White stood out so much. The Pearl Gray was another hit with us, but surprisingly so was the Deep Ocean - which is a fairly deep blue.

Above: Arctic White

Above: Pearl Gray

Above: Deep Ocean

There were a couple of model homes, and we went through one with a floor plan named 'The Thoroughbred'. They had all of their floor plans named after horses. The Thoroughbred was (of course) a white modern farmhouse style, with black windows and white trim.

PERFECT.

After speaking to a salesman who came to unlock the home, he gave us some good pointers about using the Hardie product. He said he's got a similar cement board product on his home, which he's lived in for about 18 years, and the only thing he would change is putting a stone skirt around anywhere you would shovel. For example: the front and back porch, and the garage / driveway. He told us that when you shovel against the home, over the years it can chip away at the paint, and this is what would cause the product to have imperfections and potentially peel. If you put a stone skirt along anywhere that a shovel would touch, the Hardie Product will be immaculate for years.

After ogling at the Arctic White siding, taking in all the 'farmy' details of the garage, and checking out some majorly awesome torch lanterns they had out front, we went inside.

Seriously - check out these torch lanterns! They run off of natural gas.

To our surprise, we walked in and the kitchen, living, and dining area were in the exact layout that we have on our current floor plan. The rest of the house was different, but it was definitely very neat to walk in to a home and see the layout you imagined actually set up (vaulted ceiling and all!).

Above: Thoroughbred layout, the same as our home only flipped so that the kitchen begins on the right side.

We did a quick tour of the home, and then we went on to check out their discovery centre which had all of their floor plans and colour schemes in the basement. It's a pretty cool place!

We are super happy that we went and checked out this community. Huge thanks to the Hardie Rep who told us about Braestone, it was a massive help in narrowing down our colour options and helping us see our dream home vision turning to a reality!

We are so excited for the inspiration this has brought us!

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