From Grain Silo to Dream House

I love the HGTV show "ReZoned."  It always highlights homeowners who have converted old buildings like warehouses, factories, libraries, and schools, into their dream homes. 

Tonight they showed, for the first time since I've been watching, a Kansas couple who had converted one of their farm's 25,000-bushel grain bins into their dream house.  Wheat is big out in Kansas, so I guess it just made sense!  (The owners, Vance and Louise Ehmke, apparently spent less on converting the home than they would have on building a new one from scratch, but it has everything they ever wanted, with a big open loft feel from those 31-foot ceilings.)  As you might guess, all the rooms in the house have circular outside walls (what do you expect when living in a cylindrical tower), but the Ehmkes differentiated it from the other silos on their working farm by adding homey touches like balconies and porches.  One big perk of having a galvanized steel exterior (what grain bins are made from) is that it means very little maintenance.  No need to replace the roof every 15 years on that sucker. 

I scrounged all over the Internet, hoping to find some cool pictures, but it doesn't look like these folks have made a web site yet.  The best you can hope for is to catch the episode of ReZoned when it runs again.  In the meantime, I did find some articles from back when the house was originally built.  Check them out if you want more information:

Grain Bin Design Breaks the Mold

Lane County Farmer Converts Silo into Office

Peculiar Houses from the Area to Be Shown on HGTV Show

If anyone ever comes across a picture, please post a link!

Comments

[Alice Beal]

I also enjoyed that episode and would like to see some pictures. I feel if he advertised a little bit at all more people would be interested in them kind of homes.

[Vance Ehmke]

To see photos of the Grain Bin
Scalehouse try this url:
http://agweb.com/Blogs/BlogPost.aspx?src=WheatandMore...OrLess&PID=aa12afaa-2ede-4265-b298-1d01fa69e130

It's under agweb.com at the blogs under Wheat & More...or Less by Vance Ehmke

[Monte]

Here is another web site that has a neat silo house.
www.trendir.com/house-design/silo-house-in-utah-grain-silos-rock.html