A remarkable, intensely modern two-bedroom, two-bathroom rammed earth home just over twenty minutes north of Kingston. Perhaps you'll recognise the centuries-old construction technique instantly - the walls (they are two feet thick and utility costs last year averaged $172 per month) give the illusion of a sand beach stood on end like a painting. Heat is provided by a four-zone in-floor radiant hot water system and the floors on the vaulted open-plan main level are concrete. There is an HRV to regulate humidity levels and a state-of-the-art water filtration system. There are German windows and doors so substantial that when you lever them open or closed they feel lifted from some metropolitan art gallery. The metal roof wraps up the pine-clad ceilings like a space-age raincoat. The loft makes for a presidential sort of hideaway (with an ensuite Richard Branson wanted for his island, is what I hear). The lot is a completely fenced and entirely awesome two acres. There is drainage beneath the undulating lawns and a dark, soft-edged cliff off in the corner that comes across like a giant’s pillow. I haven’t even mentioned the post and beam, the high-end appliances and induction stove, or the mile of quartz counter you lean on to contemplate the state of the world, and those ceilings so far off that laying on the couch the knots in the pine blink like night-sky stars, and every drifting thought gathers as high, gauzy cloud.