family values
Merry and Ben Albright are certainly no strangers when it comes to self-building oak-framed homes, this being their third — but their latest project proved the most challenging yet
“iwas born in the oldest house in this village, and now I live in the newest,” says Merry Albright of the stunning new oak-framed home, located in a picture postcard Herefordshire village, that she and husband Ben, along with their two children, Minerva and Gabriel, now call home. “We had been living in our second self-build for 10 years and were really happy there,” she explains. “However, Gabriel is sports mad and we knew that as he got older we would like more outside space — so we began to look for a larger plot.”
Merry, whose father is founder of oak frame specialists Border Oak and who works there herself, began to ask local landowners whether they might be interested in selling any of their land.
With no positive responses from her initial enquiries, Merry approached a landowner she had known since childhood.
“Initially, he said no,” says Merry. “Then the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) was launched — which basically rewrote planning policy and for the first time prioritised self-build. This was a game changer for us.”
Following the NPPF directives in 2012 (there have been further updates in 2018), Herefordshire Council decided to review the old development boundaries around villages and look more favourably on developments adjacent to existing settlement boundaries to increase housing delivery.
“Before this there was a blanket ban on any building outside the rural development boundaries,” explains Merry. “The NPPF suggested that this would need to relax — and so I began to think that there was now potential for the redundant farmland on the edge of the village where I had been brought up. We went back to the landowner and after persisting for a while, we came to an option agreement whereby he would sell if we could secure planning permission — on the basis that we would deal with the planning application and pay for everything, including solicitors’ fees and surveys.”
Merry and Ben submitted a preapplication request, sending their concept proposal into the planning department to gauge their response before a formal application. At this stage no one could have predicted the dramatic response that the full application would cause (see page 42).
Ben and Merry were the first in the area to use the new national planning policies and this, combined with some extraordinarily vigorous objections by a group of local residents, meant the planning battle that ensued was both stressful and lengthy (more than 12 months) — although ultimately successful.
the Design
Merry worked closely alongside the Border Oak architectural design team to design their home, starting with a broad brief based around their wish for a “big kitchen and old-fashioned pantry”.
“We knew we wanted the house to have a very high level of sustainability — whatever we built needed to be high performance, but low energy. We gave the design team a maximum budget and discussed the importance of natural light and how a courtyard configuration could be central to the design,” explains Merry.
“The plot is six acres, with no physical distinctions such as trees. We wanted to create a sense of privacy within the open field and were keen that even though the house is large, it shouldn’t look that way.”