a r c h i t e c t u r e
Bridge Farm
Extension
Bridge Farm was an exciting project for an Architect where we were lucky enough to be working with a client who presented us with a blank canvass to work with and had no preconceptions of how their remodelled house should be. A developer built detached house built on the site of a former fishery farm, whilst not unattractive, the existing house had become somewhat dated and tired. The simple massing of the house led to a predictable and uninspiring internal layout when you entered.
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Our brief was simple, create new reception spaces and Master Bedroom suite that took advantage of the beautiful extensive garden views and floodlands beyond. However, the architectural language should be a significant departure from the rather stale and safe developer architecture.
As a result of the exciting brief, we very much enjoyed this exercise in breaking through the normal architecture that we are mostly tasked with creating.
The adjacent Living Room has been extended to permit a wall of bi-folding doors to open up the room to a limestone terrace in summer months. The Zinc cladding is repeated at first floor level and is a match to the aluminium frames of the new doors and windows constructed. Again, this is shaded by a cantilevering frame over the doors where a climbing plant is being allowed to spread over.
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The boiler of the house has been replaced by a water-source heat pump that extracts embodied energy from the constantly flowing streams of the old fishery that run around the west side of the house.
A subtle 2 storey curved masonry wall shields the new rooms from the embankment railway adjacent to the house and gently directs views at both ground and first floor levels to a frameless glazed window facing due south to the views beyond. A statement projecting Zinc clad peak to the tip of the curve at first floor provides a level of protection from solar gain and further frames the view. At ground floor a galvanised steel frame has been provided to permit a trained climbing plant to envelop and add a natural surface to the modern materials otherwise used.
