Oakley House
James Bond, Palm Springs and Ibiza…. A convivial renovation of an Islington home.
Guildford Lodge was built around 1860 by Lord of Lovelace, as the gatehouse for his house, Horsley towers. Over the years it has been amended substantially to suit new uses as its purpose as a gatehouse became obsolete. The building is Grade II listed and is now solely used as a family home.
Lovelace appeared to have been quite a character with a very individual architectural style. He substantially redesigned the local village of East Horsley with a predominant use of brick and flint with many repeated details.
A balance between the use of local materials to echo the historic detailing combined with modern methods of construction has created a building fit for modern day living standards.The bricks and terracotta tiles allcame from the local Ockham brickworks owned by Lovelace. For the new extension, our client was very pro-active in the local community to source new bricks that matched the existing.
The arrangement of spaces in the original gatehouse does not lend itself naturally to a domestic home. All previous extensions of space are at ground floor level, so the upper levels remained quite small in comparison. The bedrooms thus became divided between upper and lower floors - which was very awkward for parents of young children. Our starting point was to see if there was a way of adding space to the upper floors for additional bedrooms, which would in turn free up space at ground level for living space.
We wanted to create an extension that feels like it 'belongs' to the original building, yet also has something of our time about it. The semi-circle in plan of the upper floor compliments the circular towers of the original gatehouse, and is offset from the lower floor to create a protected area for external dining. The new structure cantilevers around the curve - and sits on a brick arch. A furtherbrick arch was cut into the wall of the existing extensions. Internally, the curve of the upper floor is reflected in the ceiling, and the dining space is formed of a complimentary semi circle.