Meadow House has been designed as a retreat away from the city and creates an oasis of comfort and calm, isolated in an inspiring landscape. The architectural challenge was to integrate the new build as much as possible within the existing setting of the meadow both in terms of scale and materiality.

 

Conceived as a single-floor dwelling, the programme concentrates the circulation space into a single long corridor, creating a direct line of sight across the length of the house and leading to an open kitchen and living area. The office, sleeping areas, bathroom and storage area are distributed linearly with direct access through pocket doors from the long, spinal hallway. This is expressed in the external architecture of the building through a sequence of wooden slatted screens, acting as a glowing lantern in the evening, welcoming the residents home. Echoing the Japanese 'genkan', the entrance hallway is lower than the continuing corridor and rooms, and acts as a carefully-designed transitional space between the outside and inside.

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The exterior palette of materials is robust and clean: sand-coloured brickwork with a matching mortar, complemented by the use of white-oiled oak for all window frames and slatted panels. The outdoor veranda picks up on the motif of the wooden lattice, creating a serene, transitional space towards the immediate outdoors.

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The interior palette, light and warm, continues the outdoor theme of the house. The simplicity of this backdrop allowed us to introduce a variety of textured surfaces and offer a more tactile quality to the internal finish:  brushed brass, rattan surfaces, translucent paper, opaque glass and chrome plating. All these materials act as a counterpoint to the muted, serene environment, bringing life and highlighting specific areas of the interior. In the kitchen, the polished concrete floor (and countertop) and the stainless steel fixtures provide a contrast to the warm, muted tones of the brickwork and joinery.