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Brick Leaf House
Brick Leaf House
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Brick Leaf House
The building is located on one of the edges of
Hampstead Heath, a semi rural heath land in
north London. The brief asks for a two family
residence of 1000 m2 within a 3000 m2 plot. The
residence includes two independently accessed
living/entertaining areas, with suited bedrooms
and a communal swimming pool with gym
beneath the houses.
The plot slopes over 9m from front to back
and is dominated by two mature trees, a giant
copper beach and an English oak. The building
is similar in scale to the trees and is set
between them as a linking element defining
a lower and upper garden. The houses are
organised back-to-back and rely on a simple
configuration of outward facing rooms around
a top lit circulation space lighting the centre of
the plan. Each of these atria has an all glass
sliding roof, computer controlled to open during
sunshine hours, thus transforming the spaces
into external courts and naturally ventilating
the building. Between the two atria a further
lightwell extends down into the cave-like
swimming pool.
The large house project is quite appropriate
to this location but here we achieve a sense of
generosity without resort to an overly expensive
constructional and material treatment.
Therefore, the building uses the most everyday
form of commercial construction in the UK, a
steel frame with cavity brick and block walls
and lightweight concrete floors. By using a steel
frame it is possible to make small adjustments
to room sizes quite late into the design phase.
The nimbleness of a steel frame is one lesson
to be taken from much of the early 20thCentury
warehouse structures in London.
The new building, faced entirely in hand made
brick and matching flush pointed mortar (for
sculptural effect) has a similar texture, colour
and tone to the tree bark which dominates the
site. The flush edge detail of the facade is a
common motif of contemporary abstraction
but there are many examples of smooth edged
building throughout history as this allows water
run-off to be consistent all over with no shaded
patches. The cavity wall is enlarged to allow
for a generous insulation zone. The basement
swimming pool is sheet piled with waterproof
concrete walls internally allowing the rest of the
building to have simple trench foundations. The
ground floor slabs step, with several levels, to
allow access to the garden from all sides of the
building but the ceiling remains flat throughout.
Internally the ground floors are of sandstone
slabs with walnut hardwood plank flooring to
the first floor, staircases and all interior joinery.
Walls are simply decorated plasterboard and
there is under-floor heating throughout. The
final atmosphere is of a solid wall-like building
of generously proportioned rooms.
Hampstead Heath, a semi rural heath land in
north London. The brief asks for a two family
residence of 1000 m2 within a 3000 m2 plot. The
residence includes two independently accessed
living/entertaining areas, with suited bedrooms
and a communal swimming pool with gym
beneath the houses.
The plot slopes over 9m from front to back
and is dominated by two mature trees, a giant
copper beach and an English oak. The building
is similar in scale to the trees and is set
between them as a linking element defining
a lower and upper garden. The houses are
organised back-to-back and rely on a simple
configuration of outward facing rooms around
a top lit circulation space lighting the centre of
the plan. Each of these atria has an all glass
sliding roof, computer controlled to open during
sunshine hours, thus transforming the spaces
into external courts and naturally ventilating
the building. Between the two atria a further
lightwell extends down into the cave-like
swimming pool.
The large house project is quite appropriate
to this location but here we achieve a sense of
generosity without resort to an overly expensive
constructional and material treatment.
Therefore, the building uses the most everyday
form of commercial construction in the UK, a
steel frame with cavity brick and block walls
and lightweight concrete floors. By using a steel
frame it is possible to make small adjustments
to room sizes quite late into the design phase.
The nimbleness of a steel frame is one lesson
to be taken from much of the early 20thCentury
warehouse structures in London.
The new building, faced entirely in hand made
brick and matching flush pointed mortar (for
sculptural effect) has a similar texture, colour
and tone to the tree bark which dominates the
site. The flush edge detail of the facade is a
common motif of contemporary abstraction
but there are many examples of smooth edged
building throughout history as this allows water
run-off to be consistent all over with no shaded
patches. The cavity wall is enlarged to allow
for a generous insulation zone. The basement
swimming pool is sheet piled with waterproof
concrete walls internally allowing the rest of the
building to have simple trench foundations. The
ground floor slabs step, with several levels, to
allow access to the garden from all sides of the
building but the ceiling remains flat throughout.
Internally the ground floors are of sandstone
slabs with walnut hardwood plank flooring to
the first floor, staircases and all interior joinery.
Walls are simply decorated plasterboard and
there is under-floor heating throughout. The
final atmosphere is of a solid wall-like building
of generously proportioned rooms.
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