Before and After
Architect Richard Crawford of Witcher Crawford Architects explains how he helped his clients transform a run-down barn into a characterful family home in Wiltshire
A London house reconfigured and extended to create a modern family home with a greater sense of flow
“To create an open plan living space, an extension was added in the area of a collapsed former store”
Situated within picturesque farmland near Salisbury, Wiltshire, the existing barn was a derelict shell when the clients came across the site. The cob walls had seriously eroded over many years of disuse and the corrugated tin roof was full of holes. Our brief was to repair the external envelope of the barn and then to reinstate its original look, including a new thatched roof. Inside, the homeowners wanted the resulting property to provide two bedrooms and an open plan living area — they also wanted the option to be able to add to the house in the future. The first stage of the project was connecting the building to utilities and drainage systems. The existing barn was then altered to become the bedroom wing of the home. It now accommodates the master bedroom and a shower room at first floor level, with the second bedroom on the ground floor — an oak staircase links the two. An additional window – designed with shutters to resemble hayloft doors –
was cut into the original cob wall of the master bedroom to bring natural light into the first floor. In order to create the open plan space the clients were after, a single-storey extension was added in the area of a collapsed former store. This makes up the new living wing and accommodates the entrance hall (a front door has been relocated here to link the two elements of the building), a family bathroom, and an open plan space incorporating the kitchen, dining and living areas, which sit under a vaulted ceiling with oak trusses, evoking barn-syle buildings. Large sliding doors from Express Bi-folding Doors allow this area to be fully opened up to the new garden terrace and bring plenty of light into the living space. To update the façade, and tie the old structure with the extension, the whole house has been clad in lime render on a brick and flint plinth, and small elements of western red cedar timber cladding have also been used. In order to highlight the new and old elements of the house, the extension has been topped with a slate tile roof, while the original barn has been thatched. The project has transformed a derelict, run-down agricultural building into a functional, beautiful family home that’s full of characterful features yet also caters for modern living.