Only one woman is lucky enough to have a Soontorn Boonyatikarn as a husband. Sineerat Boonyatikarn suffers from acute breathing problems, sneezing and coughing, caused by dust and pollen. That was just the extra incentive that the environmentally conscious architect needed to design a house to block out the dust, noise and heat of Bangkok.
Mr Soontorn should be honoured as a national treasure. The 52-year-old Thai architect represents the new wave of Asian architects, a generation ahead of colleagues who ruin the landscape with shophouses and unsuitable Western copy-cat designs.
You, too, could end up living in a Soontorn international award-winning, computer-controlled 'bio-solar home' - if you can wait 10 to 20 years. This middle-class, spacious, three-bedroomed, two-storey, cool-looking home is completely self-sufficient.
Insulated walls, floors, ceilings and special laminated triple glazing keeps the air inside cool and clean. By collecting moisture and recycling waste water, the home meets its own daily water needs.
Waste provides the bio-gas for cooking. And the massive, solar-panelled roof generates enough electricity to keep the air-conditioning on all day, power the whole house, and sell the excess to the national electricity grid or, as Mr Soontorn intends, power an electric car. Sound interesting?
Do not be put off by the 480 million baht (HK$93 million) price tag. That was the cost of the major research and development project for Chulalongkorn University. Once such houses are on the market, they will sell for a mere 5 million baht, possibly less. 'This is not like the model of a future car where it is just a model,' said the architect. 'This house is a real house now.'