Three very diverse properties for you this week so we’ll see what you make of this lot. First up is this modernist house in Merseyside which is on the market for £2,750,000 via Savills.
It’s in a conservation area about 12 miles from Liverpool and no, I’m not sure how they got permission to build this there either, but leaving the technicalities aside, it’s an amazing house. I love that it’s literally half solid and and half glass and you can see straight through to what lies behind.
It was based, say Savills, on the work of the US architect Hugh Newell Jacobsen (b 1929) who drew inspiration from the large American barns of his landscape. In 1998 he designed his dream house for Life magazine as part of a series (ended in 1999) of asking expensive architects to create perfect houses for ordinary people.
Interestingly, this house breaks one of his ideas, which was that if you keep all the rooms separate – each with a distinct purpose – then it makes your house feel bigger. In an interview about his dream house design he said: “If you change venues with each event, say drinks in one room, dinner in another and coffee yet somewhere else, the house seems bigger,” he said.
I completely agree with that and am often asking clients to reconsider their grand plans for all inclusive open plan living. Although I’m not sure I have put it quite as eloquently as he did. Anyway, do you fancy this? I worry that on those cold, bleak January days it might feel a little stark. I’d like it in California for sure. I’m not sure they do bleak over there. Or stark.
The big windows are rather fabulous though aren’t they. Mind you it seems a shame to put a freestanding bath in this room and then block the view with screens. Perhaps there are neighbours…
Now for a change of scale as we head over to St Leonard’s on Sea in East Sussex to this two bedroom flat for £3750,00 via The Modern House. It still has big windows and amazing views though. It is part of Adelaide House the residence of Queen Adelaide, wife of William IV.
Those windows are 12ft high and have an uninterrupted view of the sea and although it has just two bedrooms it’s a large scale two bed flat. Queen Adelaide lived here after the King died and it has also belonged to the Boulton family, one of whom Matthew is on the £50 note in honour of his work, with James Watt, on steam engines.
I would like to say I have double checked that fact for you but there is a distinct shortage of £50 notes in The Mad House as this moment in time/always.
But never mind that, I wanted to show you the daring use of blue. What do you think? Earlier this week I was talking about Farrow and Ball neutrals and the idea of painting the walls light and the skirtings dark to ground the space and bring a more contemporary feel. The owners of this flat have taken that idea and sprinted off with it. This isn’t necessarily my particular shade of blue but I like the idea. Even that door, which looks to me like a pretty ordinary fire door looks rather lovely with its paler blue frame.
The bedrooms are up a staircase on a half-landing and, as is so often the case, the second one is small. But you are practically living on the beach and as I’ve said before it’s not location, location location it’s compromise, compromise, compromise. Well actually the location of this is pretty good. Although the same flat in Brighton would probably cost three times as much so it’s back to compromise again.
Before we tie ourselves in knots let’s to go to South Hams in South Devon to this twisty tiny cottage which is the complete antithesis of the previous two. It’s on the market with Strutt & Parker for £595,000.
It’s a pretty Grade II listed thatch cottage which was originally built in 1450 with Elizabethan and Georgian additions. The owners, who have been there for 19 years, have extended and renovated and kept as many of the original features as possible.
There are three bedrooms and two rayburns and it’s all so sweet although I’m guessing perhaps not for very tall people. I this one is my holiday house. Perhaps my winter holiday fantasy house, it feels like the kind of place you want to hunker down in and get cosy. As opposed to the first house which has now become my de facto summer house.
What I like about this is that the owners have left it all in natural colours which shows off the original features more. They have resisted the temptation to paint it red and yellow – I can’t tell you how many red and yellow rooms I see on my travels round the estate agents. I mean I know I love monochrome but there is an abundance of houses painted in either yellow or red. It is a plethora I tell you.
At nearly 1400 sq feet this is a good size as well with three decent bedrooms and a tiny office downstairs. I’m liking it more and more. What about you? How are you spending your fantasy lottery win this week?
Hello Kate, Thanks as always for bringing all these wonderful posts. One thing on the glass house posted at top, they seem to have carpet shortage issues? Best no carpet to wrong scale carpets?
Until next time, Brenda
Wow!! The Liverpool property is just amazing, in love with it, The rooms look so big that I can feel the breeze inside the come… 🙂
x
Germarie
http://www.homeology.co.za
I love the big windows of the flat and all the light that comes in from the half and half house, but my biggest concern about all these glass houses is cleaning them! Even window cleaners would have problems with some of these houses and then someone has to do the inside….
The second I saw the picture of the first house, I knew it was a HNJ house. He lives in Washington, DC, just 40 miles down the road, and so there are a higher number than usual of his houses round these parts. He’s done some pretty genius ones, using a twist on the local vernacular of architecture. Look at the Buckwalter Residence for a half/half house.
Wow that’s amazing. I want it! I love his buildings and his ideas. Thank you for telling me/us about it x
I will take the flat but move it to Brighton. Thanks!
Seaside apartment please! Having lived for over twenty years in a) a Tudor cottage and b) a Georgian terrace (with very cottagey proportions rather than traditional Georgian ones) I feel I have been there and got the t shirt on the whole traditional country living thing. Whilst I am not saying quirky period features aren’t a good thing, I am craving higher ceilings and LIGHT, both of which have been conspicuously absent in both homes and as they are grade II listed the opportunities to alter them are, of course, pretty limited. Most modest houses pre the last century were all about keeping the cold out, not letting the light in.
Regarding the first property, I feel anywhere that looks like it probably echoes when you speak does not make for a comfortable home. So yes, it is all about compromise!
You’re absolutely right about light. It was only when we moved to this house that I realised how dark the last one was – we had got used to having the kitchen lights on all the time. For the first couple of months we lived here I kept bellowing at the kids to “turn the bloody lights off” before realising they weren’t on at all!
Love the guest room a perfect space properly spaced with perfect arrangement.
Number three please, by a country mile. Have to warn you, Kate, that I’m having a lot of traditional urges at the moment….
I am wondering if the first house has just a little bit too much glass for me, hmm still pondering this one. But I think I would prefer the apartment by the sea, love the scale of the Windows. The blue is a great feature, but for me I would go with a much darker shade, it’s definitely too bright for me. I also love the Devon cottage, it made me think of my favourite Christmas movie, “The Holiday!” However I have lived in Devon for years, two of our children were born there so I am biased! I think if I won the lottery I’d have the cottage for weekends and the apartment for the week, or maybe on occasion I’d flip it round and spend a week in the country and a weekend by the sea, either way it would work for me. The only slight problem, apart from money, would be where the five children would sleep!!! Have a lovely weekend xx
Ooh Kate, you are spoiling us this week! Isn’t it great to be pulled out of your comfort zone of what you think you like and be magicked into three such different houses. The first one has the most amazing woodland garden – I’d like that please, though like you I wonder whether it would feel too cold in winter. And because it’s such a beautiful thing of itself, you’d have to seriously edit your stuff. Well I would, and I’m a bit of a sucker for pictures on walls, fabulous fabrics etc etc. I love the attention to detail in St Leonard’s – all those beautifully made bookcases etc. It’s really clever design without shouting ‘See how clever I am’. The blue is a bit too clichéd seaside for me. (Now grey would work – lovely F&B Pavilion and its friends). I would happily give up a big second bedroom for that view. As for the last house – it’s amazingly Tardis-like and I agree that the way the owners have created a counterpoint between old and new is very effective. I could defo imagine my stuff in there. So I think I’d like 2 & 3. Greedy? Moi?!?