Construction Update - Forms for 1st Floor Concrete

Last week the metal structure for the first floor was completed, and the wooden forms for the concrete sections of the first floor are going in. The concrete slabs will be done in 2 phases, first the metal beams will be encased, and then the floor sections between the beams will be added.  The wooden forms have to be supported from below while the concrete hardens, so going into the house now is a bit like walking into a forest of steel supports.

They will be adding more wooden forms and supports over the next few days, then on Wednesday hopefully they can pour the concrete.  I say 'hopefully' because the weather is forecast to be a little rainy on Wednesday and it needs to be dry when the concrete is poured.

Originally, we had hoped to build the house using more traditional building techniques, for example wood frame, instead of steel/concrete, but the current building codes in Europe seem to make it nearly impossible.  The requirements for thermal and sound insulation are very strict, and the extra weight and space that these requirements impose would have made wood framing very awkward (bordering on impossible).

In other news, I have the first successful capture from the time-lapse camera! My early plan to put the camera outside didn't work out well because when the crane came it completely blocked the view. I moved the camera inside, and looking at the result today, I think I'll be keeping it there.  Below is the month of May (excluding weekends and night time); one photo per hour condensed into a 15 second clip.  It gets interesting after about 10 seconds (when the metal structure starts going in).