sidelong glimpse. Fortunately, the Forbes’ already had an architect friend on hand to help, having already enlisted Neil Taylor of TAP Architecture to “give us his thoughts and draw up plans for.” Daniela adds: “He had designed an extension for a mutual friend’s house, and we loved it.”
The original layout of the house consisted of a dark kitchen at the front and an L-shaped sitting room which led into an uninsulated sunroom at the side of the property. The utility and dining room were in the middle with the dining room leading out to a conservatory. Upstairs there were three bedrooms and a family bathroom. While there was a lot of space, they didn’t gel with the house. The conservatory was never used, as it wasn’t particularly welcoming and didn’t connect with the house or garden. The sitting room was old fashioned and had a brick mantelpiece that ran the length of the wall, with a gas fire and a tiny little window that opened onto the sunroom and an alcove through to the dining room. “It was a large room, but you never quite knew where to sit,” Daniela recalls. With Daniela using the kitchen as a workspace in her role as a professional cook and catering consultant, the kitchen needed to perform at a commercial level as well as a domestic one. “The kitchen was in the darkest corner of the house, and spending most of my day in the kitchen, that wasn’t somewhere I wanted to work.” The couple’s wish list was straightforward, however, achieving it was anything but. This wasn’t a case of simply adding an extension on the back of the house; their requests required an entire remodel of the ground floor, which Neil was happy to offer them. At the top of the list was to put the kitchen at the heart of the home, and also to link it with the main living space which should be open plan with views out to the
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garden. An additional bedroom and ensuite were also required, along with a snug for the kids to watch movies and entertain friends, and could double up as extra bedroom/living space if required. Lastly and most importantly, the whole ground floor had to flow and have an obvious and natural connection with the garden, as well as a wow factor.
DESIGN SOLUTION Neil’s first suggestion was to get rid of both the conservatory and sunroom as they were both poorly insulated and badly constructed, and replace them with a new extension. As there was no way to add another bedroom upstairs, he had to come up with a way to incorporate one on the ground floor.
“Neil did some fantastic drawings playing
around with various configurations as to what should go in the extension and what could be incorporated into the existing house,” says Daniella. The final design put the new fourth bedroom – which was to be Daniela’s and Duncan’s – at the front of the house with views over a courtyard space where the sunroom used to be. The old kitchen became the snug connected to a new shower room with sliding doors to maximise the space. The utility room was retained and kitted out as Daniela’s work and storage space with floor to ceiling cupboards to house her appliances and general kitchen clutter. In the middle of the house, the dining room has been transformed into a contemporary kitchen with an internal glazed screen partially closing it off from the main living/dining area in the new extension. With Daniela using the kitchen as a workspace, it needed to be easy to clean and offer lots of surface space. By customising basic IKEA units with stainless steel worktops and splashbacks the look is modern but practical,
LOW POINT
“When we moved in and didn’t have worktops for quite a long time – that was frustrating.”
DANIELA’S TOP TIPS
Use an architect. I’ve seen projects where people have gone it alone and I think we’ve got something far better than what we could have come up with ourselves. A good architect opens up possibilities that you would never have considered. Make sure the
contractor you choose is someone you can talk to so you can have a good working relationship with them.
Check out their previous work; we knew James had a good work ethic and we’d seen some of his previous work, so we knew things were going to be done well.
sep/oct 2021
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