Lansdowne Drive
We recently completed the renovation of a 1970s end-of-terrace house close to London Fields in Hackney. A number of these terraced houses were built in the 1970s in the borough, designed by the council‘s architecture department seeking to solve London‘s pressing need for family housing, whilst simultaneously seeking to maintain the predominant “Party Wall” characteristics of these primary residential neighbourhoods. Unlike traditional 19th century terraced housing, where staircases run parallel to the Party (or dividing) Walls, resulting in long corridors and up to 40% of a floor plan being wasted as circulation space, this house type turns the dog-leg staircases 45 degrees placing it in the centre of the plan. This simple move results in more efficient use of space allowing overall plot widths to be reduced by around a quarter to 3.6m wide. Bathrooms are also accommodated in the centre of the plan, creating compact and thus economic housing that benefits from front and rear gardens, maintaining the street scale and urbane architectural atmosphere of London street houses. As a consequence, the council architects found that you can fit ten of these new house types on land that otherwise would have accommodated only 8 traditional terraced houses - and because of the compact form (no distended rear extensions such as you find on Georgian and Victorian Row Houses) it was possible to much economically too. This project is a thoughtful and loving upgrade the to 1970s house bringing it to date with contemporary thermal insulation standards, and making the most of its end-of-terrace situation.
Our work consisted of replacing all of the original single-glazed windows with triple-glazed ones, also side-hung, plus the introduction of three new windows on the south-facing gable facade. In addition, we also introduced patio-doors and windows on the rear facade, and re-ordered the ground floor plan. This involved switching the position of the kitchen so that it now runs along the northern Party Wall, and introducing a new door to the garden in alignment with the entrance door. We also reduced the size of the shower room and cut back the first part of the stair, creating a new winder stair at its base. As a consequence the ground floor now feels much more spacious and generous. A new oak kitchen made of Denmark sits within a sequence of enfilade open-plan oak lined rooms - creating what is arguably the best of both worlds, free-flowing spaces that feel homely and distinctive. Oak joinery items continue into the gardens creating privacy and comfort, and a new identity for the end of terrace house. Terracotta tiles and underfloor heating complete the actual and figurative sense of warmth and welcome. Small, slit windows on the internal walls allow sunlight and daylight to enter into the upper floor bathroom and into the kitchen, subtle changes that enhance the sense of spatial layering adding interest and delight to what was already an incredibly efficient plan-type.
At the top of the house the existing top-lit bathroom light well is enhanced with dramatic orangey-red paint - “Vulcain” by Argile Peinture, emphasising the effects of warmth of sunlight falling into the newly rendered bathroom, making it glow. Elsewhere, walls are painted with Argile‘s “Sarrasin” colour, appearing grey in some rooms and green in others, depending upon the strength and character of the light entering through the leaves and branches of the numerous trees that characterise this street corner location. The red and the greens intensify and amplify each other in a satisfying manner, intensifying a pleasing aspect of the physics of colour theory whereby two complimentary colours - at opposite ends of the visual spectrum - work in concert to celebrate the other.
