Contemporary Town Houses

This tight inner city site, comprising mainly a small group of rundown and aging commercial units, is the setting for their proposed demolition and the erection of 5no. new build family townhouses with the client brief to maximise the site potential.

Drawing on the local context much of the underlying vernacular relates historically to the mews style stable or coach house, typically of two/three storeys with wider and larger ground floor apertures and generally smaller symmetrical windows at first floor and above.

This context has very much informed the new proposals with reference to the character of the area providing a sound grounding for the design. Five units appear as wider frontages which are split into two behind the conjoined facade for all but one of the units which steps down to two storeys to acknowledge its immediate neighbour.

These simple, high quality contemporary town houses comprise ground floor kitchen-living-dining areas with 2-3 bedrooms & bathrooms / en-suites above. The second floor master suite is set back echoing the roofscape in the street with west facing front terraces affording a distant sea view for each.

The ground floor of each unit fronts directly onto back of pavement and for privacy the units are provided with large sliding timber screens that reference the coach house typology. Behind these screens wider, larger apertures are fully glazed maximising light from front to back of plan. These apertures historically reference the ground floor carriage-way and more recently the garages that serve the existing commercial units.

The proposals are currently in the planning process.