House in a Garden | Gianni Botsford Architects

A copper roofed pavilion in a hidden urban garden, Gianni Botsford Architects’ House in a Garden is a highly unusual dwelling accessed through a narrow passage alongside an 1840s Notting Hill villa, a building Botsford had previously extended with a two-storey garden flat on the top two floors for his own home.

The House in a Garden started out as a project on a plot of land the architects themselves intended to develop having been aware of the potential of the site for over 15 years. This involved the demolition of a 1960s bungalow and its replacement with a largely subterranean house. Once the lengthy planning process was completed, Gianni Botsford Architects sold the plot and their design to a private client who committed to making the House in a Garden into a home for himself.

By the time the house was completed in September 2018, some 8 years later, Gianni Botsford Architects’ client’s circumstances had changed requiring a much larger house. Nonetheless, the design and detailing of the Notting Hill home was seen through to completion by the client as originally planned by Gianni Botsford Architects. 

Externally the most visible component of the house is its pavilion like copper-clad roof. Inside, the roof comprises of a complex glulam timber structure made from spruce, its double curvature concluding in a glazed oculus. The roof has a floating quality set above a glass walled living room that enhances a sense of lightness while connecting the interior of the house to the surrounding landscaped garden as well as to its urban context. 

Copper recurs throughout house, in surfaces of the ground floor kitchen and in detailing of rooms below, adding a subtle tonal warmth to the interior. As a natural material mined from the earth, copper resonates well with the idea of much of the house being shaped underground. It also reflects light. 

There are two levels below the ground floor. Bedrooms are immediately below ground, while there is a generous living/ gallery area with a 10 metre long swimming pool on a level further below. Lightwells and skylights are designed to optimise daylight casting toplight onto the walls of lower ground floors. 

Introducing daylight to a depth of up to eight metres was a challenge especially as the site of the house is tight and north facing. Digital analysis tools were used to seek out the three-dimensional possibilities that light gives in terms of generating the form and organisation of the building. 

The contrast between the cool and warm tones of Douglas Fir and carved Carrara  marble adds to the sensual quality of the underground spaces as does the carefully studied play of light against darkness. As marble is quarried from the earth, it feels consistent with these spaces carved from a plot of urban land. In this way, materially it has a similar effect. The House in a Garden builds on Gianni Botsford Architects’ earlier preoccupations with the manipulation of natural light throughout the day and through the seasons, enriching, enlivening and, ultimately, defining the nature of the architecture. Gianni Botsford describes the house,

“To build with light and darkness is to work with what a context gives you - a unique set of constraints and opportunities. Shaped and informed by the light and shadow that surround it, the roof’s tent like form creates a new place for life to occur in the house - one that turns its back on the large volumes surrounding it and embraces the site.” 

Each individual and unique piece of the timber roof structure is curving in three directions and was pre-fabricated in the Dolomites from three dimensional models Gianni Botsford Architects provided. The pieces were then brought to site and craned into position in eight sections.  Gianni Botsford summarises the concept for roof,

“Designed, modelled and fabricated using both digital and manual processes each feeding the other, the intensity of the complex timber roof structure belies its warm domestic scale and character’’.

The Wing sofa, designed by Antonio Citterio, was chosen to furnish this one-of-a-kind living room. Complementing the space with its light, airy appearance, the Wing sofa’s architectural lines are formed by soft geometric shapes that have no sharp corners.

ITA - Un singolare tetto in rame a forma di imbuto caratterizza questa casa ubicata nel rinomato quartiere di Notting Hill a Londra, frutto di un originale progetto di riqualificazione di una casa che risale al 1840.  Il progetto architettonico è stato curato dall’architetto Gianni Botsford. Nel corso di un processo di pianificazione e costruzione durato circa otto anni, Botsford e il suo team hanno creato una casa parzialmente sotterranea sormontata da un sorprendente tetto in legno rivestito da strisce di rame.
La vista interna del soggiorno cattura immediatamente l’attenzione e viene spontaneo volgere lo sguardo verso l’alto ad ammirare la forma del soffitto e la luce che entra dalle ampie pareti in vetro.
Per arredare questo spazio living unico nel suo genere è stato scelto il divano Wing, disegnato da Antonio Citterio, caratterizzato da un aspetto aereo e leggero e da una costruzione architettonica costituita da volumi geometrici morbidi e del tutto privi di spigoli.