Cotswolds House
A new build low energy family home partly recessed into a steep slope within a traditional, stone built Cotswold village.
Our clients had purchased a tight steeply sloping site lying within a small 1970's development located in a traditional stone built Cotswold village when they approached us to design and oversee their new home. The house perches at the top of the site, amongst the trees and steps down the hillside away from the road. Cutting into the slope allowed us to create a larger house than meets the eye from the road and made the most of the limited available land without undermining the close neighbouring houses.
The house is conceived of as a lower and an upper house, each with distinctive characters and each borrowing materials and tones from their context in different ways to produce a house that speaks to its neighbours and the wider village without sacrificing its modern ideals. The dry Cotswold stone wall clad entrance section of the upper house sits forward protecting our clients from the elements whilst the rendered section of the lower house contains the open plan living level and the lower level bedrooms and study. The upper house is clad in timber that will grey in time allowing the upper bedrooms level to recess into the tree line and soften down. The two houses are linked by a cantilevered staircase and highly glazed southern facades overlook the millstream and woodland below. With such close neighbours and a tight site we were careful that windows and rooflights were located to provide views and daylight without compromising privacy.
A rigorously sustainable approach was taken to the construction with a prefabricated timber frame used to avoid the higher embodied carbon of steel. Beyond building regulation requirement insulation levels were adopted and an air tightness rating of less than three was achieved on site. All glazing is triple glazed with solar control included to the southern and western sides of the building. The building is powered by solar panels and an air source heat pump which together with underfloor heating throughout and whole house ventilation with heat recovery ensure that the house has inherently low running costs.
