Baalbec Road built in 1886 is a terrace of houses finely detailed in brick with terracotta motifs and is now Grade 2 listed. The property retains many of its original ornate cornices, ceiling roses and picture rails and also has original decorative fireplaces. The layout is a fairly standard London house spread over three floors with a cellar type basement and a two-storey rear extension which has a flat roof terrace overlooking Highbury fields.

The rear of the house is north facing and over shadowed by the trees in Highbury Fields as is the middle room, which has little natural light. Our proposals attempt to address these issues to provide a home more suited to the client’s needs and lifestyle, whilst respecting the historic nature of the existing house. The quality of its original detailing is retained and reflected in the design details used for the new interventions.

Listed building consent was obtained to make openings in the walls between the ground floor rooms to open them up to each other in such a way so as not to interfere with the original plan form or detailing, whilst exploiting the possibility of long views and natural or borrowed light. Establishing a datum, the top lit shelf passes through each room linking the spaces and illuminating the original detailing. This element was developed with a number of 3D studies to investigate how it worked as part of the design development. The basement was extensively remodelled to provide natural light and self-contained accommodation for grown up children.

Date: 2010
Structural Engineer: Rodrigues Associates
Photographs: Mike Pevsner

This mews site occupies the end of three long gardens to listed buildings on an adjacent main road and is within a mature conservation area. The client wished to develop the area to provide three new mews houses. A number of one and two storey buildings had already been developed on the mews, however as the buildings have been erected over many years there was no unifying pattern or streetscape. HEO’s approach was to create a design with proportions reflecting the character of the surrounding conservation area rather than the immediately adjacent constructions. Spatial restrictions of the site meant that a space-producing solution would be required if the properties were to be of a sufficient size to house families.

Excavating down has increased the internal floor area of the house, while allowing the external street frontages to remain at two storeys high, in keeping with mews type buildings. The basement level is the main hub of the house, with a kitchen, dining and living area, both opening up onto a generous courtyard garden. The courtyard not only opens up and extends the living area to the outside, but also fills the space with light. A staircase leading up from this courtyard provides access to the sedum roof above the living area, another outdoor space to enjoy. The upper two levels contain three bedrooms, two bathrooms and a utility room in each house. The ground floor is planned in accordance with lifetime homes guidance; level access and all facilities to enable occupation by an occupant with access issues are provided. The staircase is planned with a core that would allow for the installation of a lift should this become necessary.
Externally the saw tooth profile of the houses’ roofs comfortably negotiates the falling external ground level as well as allowing for collecting and distributing light deep into the houses and rainwater storage. It also provides a solar panel array on each house.

What appears from the outside to be a neat and private mews house opens up unexpectedly once inside to create a light and spacious living environment with enjoyable outdoor spaces, rare to find in houses on such restricted sites.

Date: 2010
Quantity Surveyor: Anthony Silver and Associates
Structural Engineer: Copp Wilson Pettit Moore
Planning Consultant: Firstplan Ltd
Images: Louise Scannell & David Howel-Evans

St John’s Park is a modest infill house set within the grounds of one of the large villas in the St John’s park conservation area that encircle the impressive St John’s parish church in Blackheath. The house was built circa 1950 and had accommodation in line with the aspirations of the day, smallish rooms, but an integral garage. This gave the already rather incongruous house a plain and unwelcoming appearance that was in stark contrast to the more elegant surrounding properties.
The internal arrangements required substantial reworking on the ground floor to provide a comfortable open family home with a good relationship to the large garden behind. This was facilitated by extending to the front, rear and side of the building along with internal demolitions. Additions to the front of the house include a new bay window to the garage (refurbished as a playroom), a porch with steps up to a relocated front door and new timber windows (to replace recent plastic ones). These are all designed to replicate the original proportions and details of what might have been present in 1950’s housing with the aim of giving the house a more open and dignified street appearance.
To the rear a language of linked extensions dramatically improves daylighting to the house, setting up an elegant relationship for the internal rooms with the garden. By cantilevering a bay in the kitchen it was possible to add a washing and cleaning area without compromising the floorplan. This was reserved for a multifunctional family island, which fills the primary space of the kitchen with easy links to the dining, garden room and utility areas. These are separated with new and salvaged screens enabling the family full and open spaces as well as offering the opportunity to close them down to more cellular ones if required.

Date: 2009-2010
Photography: Jefferson Smith
Images: Louise Scannell
Structural Engineer: Copp Wilson Pettit Moore

At Edith Road our brief was to maximise the use of the ground floor the three storey Victorian house for the owners who are advancing in years. The new extension is conceived very much as part of the garden but also increases the thermal comfort of the living room behind (which was also dri-lined for enhanced thermal performance)
The clients wanted a room that captured south facing sun in the winter, provided external dining in the cooler months and full enjoyment of the garden all year round. The location of the enclosure outside the existing French doors was also on the main route to the constantly used back door of the house. The modern extension had to sit comfortably with the original house with its high Victorian design, terracotta detailing and fine joinery.
The design is conceived as deep masonry wall parallel to the main house with a glazed roof over the space between it and the original building. It is built in brick to compliment the existing brickwork and defines the area of enclosure for the space as well as forming a seating area very much in the manner of the landscaping of the garden. Bespoke stainless steel fixed and sliding screens designed to be left open all summer result in the area becoming a covered part of the garden. They are then closed in the winter allowing the space to relate more to the inside of the house. Their design ensures they look good in both states.
Since completion in early spring 2011 the clients have eaten all their meals in this outside room and it can be used all evening in the summer when the dew would normally curtail outside dining at sunset.

Date: 2011
Structural Engineer: Copp Wilson Pettit Moore
Photography: Mike Pevsner

This property is a paired villa house type, of cottage like character and very narrow at less than four meters wide. Entered via a side alley, a central front door gives onto a tiny lobby with a central stair running across the house. This made for tricky greetings and farewells. In addition the kitchen was less than half the width of the house, so very small. HEO proposed to enclose the majority of the side alleyway, move the front door towards the street, provide a decent entrance hall, demolish the existing kitchen and extend the house into the garden taking up the full width of the site. This expansion has yielded a decent entrance lobby, downstairs WC and coat cupboard, a snug room and a top lit kitchen/ dining room with a large glazed screen giving on to the garden. This has been achieved without affecting the other spaces in the house and rather than reducing the garden by any major dimension has actively brought it into the clients’ use. The extension to the rear is a simply detailed brick box with a parapet hiding its roof and emphasizing its cubic qualities. It stands, as a building in it own right, contrasted with the white render of the existing house behind.

Date: 2010
Structural Engineer: Copp Wilson Pettit Moore
Photography: Jefferson Smith