Tanglewood, Carol and Geoff Blunsum’s new grand-scale timber house on the banks of the River Nant in Argyll, complements its native woodland setting perfectly.

Dramatic overhanging eaves, all-round decking and a large double-height living area (which the couple refer to as “the great room”) have combined to create a contemporary take on a traditional forest lodge.

Yet, Tanglewood, at Otter Creek, Taynuilt, is no mere triumph of style over substance. It is an energy-efficient eco-savvy dwelling, which was achieved on a sensible budget of £230,000, thanks to the couple taking an active role during the two-and-a-half year construction of the house.

“I was very hands-on,” says Geoff, a retired telecommunications engineer. “I’ve never done anything like it before and it was a steep learning curve.

“Having taken retirement, I was able to devote all my energies to it. My job was to get up in the morning, supervise the build and get stuck in. I was one of the hands during the construction — the gopher.

“There were moments, such as when I was up to my knees in mud putting in drainage pipes, when I thought, ‘hang on, I’m too old to be doing this. I ought to be sitting round watching someone else do it’.

“There were other times when I thought, ‘hell’s teeth — this is taking a lot longer than it does on Grand Designs’, but there was always a determination to get it done.”

The idea for Tanglewood emerged 10 years ago, he said. “We’ve always wanted to build a wooden house, but family and work take priority and you don’t get the chance to do things like this.

“What really spurred us on was visiting friends in Canada. They had just built their own home and they said, ‘you can really do it’. Hence the name Tanglewood: when we decided to build this house, we were staying in a lodge in Canada called Tanglewood.”

Geoff and Carol, a nurse, were living in Bristol with their grown-up family when they found the site for their new home on the Plotfinder website. They spent a week visiting a number of other sites before settling on the one at Otter Creek.

Then, word of mouth led them to the Oban-based architect Shauna Cameron. “Initially, Shauna asked us to make a scrapbook of all the things that we wanted — and didn’t want — in a house,” says Geoff.

“So that’s what we did. We’ve done a lot of travelling in America and Canada, and we gave Shauna photographs of some of the houses we had stayed in.

Times recommends

• Second homes: credit crunch casualty or money-spinner?
• How I built my own sliding house
• Top 10 incentives for house buyers