Commendation for best house of three or more storeys
Lofty looks
This detached two-bedroom four-storey house is a one-off in every sense of the words. It is the only four-storey house so far built at Bolnore Village, Crest Nicholson’s replica of a traditional English village, which will have some 1,600 homes when it is complete, and there are apparently no plans at this stage to repeat it in later phases. Yet it is a house of real character, standing out among a sea of unremarkable two- and three-storey vernacular housing designs.
Built of brick with white weatherboard cladding to the top two storeys and brick buttresses at each corner on the ground floor, it would look more at home somewhere on the East coast among the fishermen’s lofts it resembles rather than inland in West Sussex. In many ways, it is as impracticable as living in a windmill or a converted water tower, effectively having only one large room on each floor (not counting bathrooms and other utilities). But what rooms they are – and what views they afford in all directions (except on the sides where the windows are within a few feet of the neighbouring houses).
Apart from the number of stairs one inevitably has to climb, this is a very liveable house, which was sold for less than £200,000. Its front door opens into a hall, off which is a cloakroom and a small fire lobby that one has to go through to get to the large kitchen/dining room, which has windows on three sides and French doors opening onto steps down to a small back garden.
On the first floor is a large living room with French doors to a small balcony. There is also a study area in one corner of the room, which could be partitioned off to make a third bedroom if required. On the second floor is a master bedroom with an ensuite bathroom that has a bath and separate shower, plus a large dressing room with a wall of fitted wardrobes. On the attic floor, whose ceiling dips down at each corner because of the gabled roof on all sides, is another double bedroom and ensuite bathroom. A fun house that deserves to stand in a large open space, or on top of a hill or cliff, or in the middle of a wood or forest.
HomeBuilder: CREST NICHOLSON SOUTH LIMITED
Nicholson House, 41 Thames Street, Weybridge,
Surrey, KT13 8JG
Tel 01932 700500 Fax 01932 700555
Contact: Graeme Milne, Managing Director
Email: gmilne@crestnicholson.com
Website: www.crestnicholson.com
Architects: OMEGA PARTNERSHIP LIMITED
Glenavon House, 39 Common Road, Claygate, Surrey KT10 0HG
Tel 01372 470313 Fax 01372 470358
Contact: Alex Russell
Email: alex@omegapartnership.co.uk
