sit within flood zones so the landscape architect designed in the ponds to store flood water by altering various levels around the farmyard as part of a SuDS sustainable drainage strategy. Now that the landscaping has had a chance to mature a little, Bill says that he’s delighted to see wildlife settling in around his new home: “A noisy frog has moved in to one of the ponds recently and we see lots of different insects, birds and bats flying around.”
As you enter the house from the garden, the entrance hall provides a clear view through the dining area and lounge and out to the landscape beyond, with the gardens carefully planted with a wide range of native plants and trees to help assimilate the building into its rural setting. The kitchen and dining table share a large open-plan space in the middle of the house. “Everything revolves around the kitchen,” says Barbara. “And we use the dining table every day but not necessarily just for eating around – we use it for business meetings as well.” A double-sided fireplace built into a section of wall which also contains the fridge freezer separates this area from the lounge, which has large full-height corner windows to provide a strong connection to the outside spaces while flooding the interior with daylight. The lounge leads into a self-contained television room in the north-facing single storey extension. “The TV is in a separate room off the lounge,” Bill explains. “We like to watch the cricket so it’s lovely to kick back in my armchair in front of a big screen, but when we have guests we generally keep the TV room closed off. It’s not a cinema!”
The other single-storey space, on the south side of the house, provides a self-contained annex and is accessed via the entrance hall. It’s
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“Our home looks like it might have once been a Dutch barn even though it’s actually a timber- framed new house”
currently being used as a spacious home office but it is equipped with a bathroom and small contained store area which can serve as a kitchenette.
“The ground floor annex was designed to be flexible but capable of providing suitable accommodation for a live-in carer should that be something Bill and Barbara need at some point,” explains the building’s architect, Richard Hawkes. “At the moment it’s working well as a home office and hobby room so it’s good to see these spaces adapting well to different functions.”
The first floor can be accessed from the staircase within the main hall or by the lift which is discreetly located off the back kitchen area. “We love having the lift,” says Bill. “It’s a real treat to use the lift rather than the stairs these days.”
Upstairs, the house has four bedrooms, two with ensuite bathrooms, and the master bedroom benefits from a large walk-in wardrobe. Barbara says that when she was thinking about how her new house should look, she loved the
november/december 2019
LOW POINT
“One of the ponds kept losing its water because the blue clay hadn’t sealed it properly so we had to redo it. The ponds are flood prevention measures, integral to our design, creating a sustainable drainage strategy and bringing many biodiversity enhancements. This leak was a pain but now it’s all done and replanted it’s water under the bridge so to speak.” – Bill Cammegh
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