A house of birch
An asymmetric cedar clad extension featuring a large-scale pivot door adds a contemporary kitchen, dining and living area to a three-bed terrace in Teddington, South west London.
In addition to creating space for cooking and entertaining, the brief from the owners - a young couple about to start a family - included bringing more natural light into the rear north-facing side of the house and adding storage across the ground floor. Forgeworks’ design overcomes the problems found in many mid-sized terraces, including low ceilings, a hallway with no ‘touch down’ space, a narrow galley kitchen, and small living and dining rooms. The new extension reflects the owners’ love of Scandinavian design, with clean lines and a material palette of natural wood, white painted exposed brick walls, stainless steel backsplash and pale grey concrete worktop and kitchen island.
Maximising natural light, the pivot door reads almost as a picture window when closed and creates a seamless connection to the new garden terrace when open. At over 2x2m, its size is unusual in an extension of this scale and its minimal appearance belies the careful engineering required to place the offset tight to the wall. Care was also taken to conceal the outer frame within the flush threshold, brickwork reveals and black cedar rain screen soffits.
A bespoke cast concrete island and dining table is the centrepiece of the new kitchen, paired with birch plywood faced units and joinery designed by the architects. Hidden steelwork in the ceiling, necessary to achieve the open plan layout, creates a ‘floating’ corner above the island and additional daylight is pulled in through five large roof lights. Back of house storage and the utility space is accessed through concealed a flush doors.
Across the rest of the ground floor a light touch approach included adding storage in the hallway with a built-in bench and umbrella stand, and in the living room with bespoke cupboards and shelves – again in birch plywood. Apart from the original staircase, many of the house’s period features had been stripped out over the years. Character has been reintroduced through contemporary interpretations of traditional Victorian detailing such as the creation of a dado line with the use of block colour and routing the flat doors to reference a four panel look. On the first floor, high performance insulation has been added to the previously cold back bedroom to create a comfortable work from home space. A new family bathroom replaces the poorly arranged split toilet bath, finished in resin based terrazzo to create modern monolithic appearance.
Project information:
Location: Teddington, South West London, UK
Building type: Two-storey victorian terrace
Scope: Rear & side extension, ground & first floor internal remodelling, refurbishment, interior design & landscaping.
RIBA Stages: 1-6 ( Concept to onsite delivery )
Gross internal floor area: 122m2 / 1313sqft
Completion: 2024
Project team: Forgeworks Architects, Structures Made Simple
Main contractor: Metropolitan Construction Ltd
Glazing: MGI Ltd
A house of birch
Photographs by French and Tye