This week's instalment of the #SBIDinspire interior design series features a light and airy residential design. This large and comfortable house had already been extended 10 years earlier, but this was demolished to provide an even larger replacement, featuring a study area, extra living space and a small service kitchen hidden behind a full-height sliding door.
In keeping with the calm and minimal tone requested by the client, SBID Accredited Design Practise, Richard Dewhurst Interior Architecture chose a muted colour palette was used throughout the house. The odd burst of colour was, however, tactfully used in the smaller spaces of the house, such as the bathroom and study.
Practice: Richard Dewhurst Interior Architecture
Project: Balham House Extension
Location: Balham, United Kingdom
What was the client's brief?
The brief was to design a light and airy rear extension that didn’t simply feel like a white box grafted onto the back of the house and that was both calming and minimal. She also wanted a very impressive and modern kitchen, but one that was easy to use and could hide the mess as she readily admitted that cooking wasn’t really her thing!
In general, my client had quite a conservative approach to the project, but thankfully she was very happy for me to get creative with the guest loo, which proved to be fun.
What inspired the interior design of the project?
The main driving factor behind this design was my enthusiasm for clerestory windows and the calmness and clarity of light they bring to a space. Having seen plenty of them in other buildings, I was excited to finally get the opportunity to build one.
What was the toughest hurdle your team overcame during the project?
The clerestory window feature was more complex to design and detail than I'd originally thought, meaning that I had to work closely with the window manufacturer and structural engineer to ensure that it functioned well and looked good.
Also, I desperately tried to convince my client that she should replace her sixty-foot long fake grass lawn with the real thing, as I’m getting increasingly frustrated and upset by the environmental damage this stuff causes to the local ecology, especially when considering the role city back gardens play in creating wildlife corridors in urban areas. Unfortunately, this was a battle I couldn't win.
What was your highlight of the project?
I was so pleased that my client loved the clerestory window and the guest loo as it always surprises her guests; they simply don't expect to see the stretch ceiling and seamless walls!
Questions answered by Richard Dewhurst, founder, Richard Dewhurst Interior Architecture.
We hope you feel inspired by this week's residential design! Let us know what inspired you #SBIDinspire
If you missed last week's Project of the Week, featuring a unique facility designed to surpass all expectations of a traditional care home, click here to see more.
This week's instalment of the #SBIDinspire interior design series features a cool, clean and industrial-inspired residential design located in a conservation area in leafy Balham, South West London. SBID Accredited Designer, Richard Dewhurst Interior Architecture was tasked with fully refurbishing, re-configuring and extending the five-bedroom Victorian family house. The project involved adding a large open plan ground floor extension to the rear of the property, whilst configuring the rest of the ground floor to include a formal sitting room, utility room, ground floor guest toilet and extra storage. The rest of the house was sensitively restored and redecorated with one bedroom being converted to a study and both bathrooms redesigned.
Project: Balham House
Location: London, United Kingdom
The brief was to completely transform a much loved (but very tired) family home into a place suited to modern living, without losing that feeling of belonging. Being very keen gardeners, I was also asked to make the garden more of a feature from within the house.
My clients love for their house was clearly a driving factor in my approach and their new found enthusiasm for the industrial aesthetic allowed me to explore the use of exciting elements and materials such as the metal framed windows, glazed brick slips, polished concrete flooring and engineered brickwork.
Wrap around windows were used to form the connection to the garden and a living sedum roof was installed to give a verdant view from the bedroom windows. I also used crazy paving for the patio, substituting the mortar with moss to soften the transition.
Other interesting touches were to re-use salvaged Victorian tiles from the original demolished conservatory floor and installing a custom made mural of a vintage map showing the local area when the house was first built.
Due to initial delays caused by bad weather and because of a very long supply lead time, the windows had to be ordered before the openings were formed meaning that all of the responsibility was on my shoulders if they didn't fit, but thankfully they did!
The decision to re-use hundreds of the original Victorian floor tiles salvaged from the old conservatory seemed like a good idea at the time, but it turned out to be a complex, challenging and time consuming process as there were so many different shapes, sizes and colours to contend with. They all had to be labelled and sorted before the jigsaw puzzle could begin.
What was your team’s highlight of the project?
Seeing my clients move back in and immediately feel settled and at home, even though everything had changed!
Questions answered by Richard Dewhurst, Founder of Richard Dewhurst Interior Architecture
We hope you feel inspired by this week's Residential design! Let us know what inspired you #SBIDinspire
If you missed last week's Project of the Week featuring a comforting, patient-focused healthcare design, click here to see more.
Want to become SBID Accredited? Click here to find out more.
It's time to talk toilets. Are you wondering what to do with your next guest loo? As the old saying goes, big things come in small packages - and in this case, the toilet! Usually the smallest room of a residential project, SBID Accredited Designer, Richard Dewhurst of Richard Dewhurst Interior Architecture has much bigger ideas. Who said the guest lavatory can't be just as lavish as the rest of the house? Richard explains why guest washrooms deserve their time to shine and how he has designed these small, often overlooked spaces with maximum impact - making a statement that will leave a lasting impression on any visitor!
Having worked on many residential refurbishment projects over the years, I’ve come to realise that the smallest room in the house can offer one of the best opportunities to get creative and interestingly, it seems that even the most conservative of clients can be convinced that the guest loo is a wonderful way of showing friends and family that they not only have a fun side, but are willing to push the design boundaries, giving them a bit of added kudos to boot.
On many occasions I’ve been able to spend a disproportionally larger budget on this room than anywhere else in the house, allowing myself to try out new ideas, use interesting materials or simply to specify an item I haven’t had the chance to use before. With the seemingly unending supply of new and exciting products coming to market, this room provides a perfect platform to let one’s creativity shine.
Here are three guest loos I’ve recently designed, which incidentally, are in different but identical houses on the same side of the same street, creating a touch of loo envy between the neighbours!
In this room I decided to go for a strong monochrome look, creating a bold and powerful statement by using different versions of the same hex tile from a range by Mandarin Stone. I further accentuated the geometric feel by using Duravit Vero Sanitaryware and a facetted, brushed & pierced brass ceiling light from Tom Dixon. The moody and sultry atmosphere was further enhanced by painting the walls and ceiling matt black and by using a matt black tap by Dornbracht.
My clients wanted a more traditional look in their loo so I lined the room with new tongue and groove panelling painted in Farrow & Ball Off Black, complimented by a fun but sophisticated Fornasetti feature wallpaper from Cole & Son. The floor was covered in wonderfully patinated Victorian floor tiles salvaged from a recently demolished conservatory and laid in a pattern of my design. I sourced the Victorian sink & stand from English Salvage and after a light restoration, it looked amazing! A pair of lovely art deco taps supplied by Architectural Antiques, a vintage mirror and articulated wall lights by Dowsing and Reynolds completed the look.
Sometimes it’s fun to design a completely unexpected space and I certainly had the opportunity to on this project. The stunning backlit stretch ceiling by Barisol created a perfectly uniform light spread, and the seamless curved polished plaster walls gave a feeling of spatial infinity. This was offset by the handmade turquoise Czech tiles; adding a burst of deep colour and lushness to the room. The concrete sink was by Kast and space-age looking wall-mounted toilet from CP Hart.
About the Author
Award-winning designer, Richard Dewhurst of Richard Dewhurst Interior Architecture specialises in quality interiors for the residential and commercial sector. After recently relocating his practice to Portsmouth, Richard is now taking project enquiries in the South Coast.
This article was written by Richard Dewhurst of Richard Dewhurst Interior Architecture.
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