'a beautiful contemporary design, tactfully & imaginatively woven into its surroundings and able to meet the very exacting requirements of NPPF paragraph 55.' 

South East Regional DRP (SERDRP)

A pioneering one-off house, and an exemplar of sustainable design, set in a steeply sloping landscaped site outside the village of Bow Brickhill, near Milton Keynes.  Set into the ground and following the contours of the hill the new house was expressly designed to minimise visual impact on surrounding dwellings and countryside. A finely engineered timber grid-shell roof structure supports a large, gently undulating grass roof and is ‘a striking and beautiful feature of the house’ (SERDRP).  Full height glazed panels give views out onto woodland, and timber louvres provide screening to limit solar gain and reflection, giving a simplicity to the building when viewed from afar.  

This house was designed to be an exemplar of sustainable design, employing the most innovative and up to date technologies available at the time to create a zero carbon and self-sufficient building that could run off-grid. SERDRP commented ‘the approach to dealing with energy and water is exemplary and defines the project as a fine example of how to deal with these issues on isolated sites’

A subtle yet striking, modest but expansive design it satisfied the stringent requirements of NPPF, paragraph 55 and was recognized by SERDRP as being ‘an outstanding work of architecture’.

Client:    Simon Fraser
Stages:  RIBA 0 - 3