Notting Hill House

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​We refurbished and joined together two 5-storey Edwardian terraced houses into one large family home, including back gardens and rear mews houses.  This required the houses to be completely gutted and re-structured in a complex building process, given the highly constrained site in a Conservation Area, as well as the need to be particularly sensitive to neighbours.

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The main house and mews are joined across a hard-landscaped courtyard via a glazed link.  The courtyard surfaces are clad in Portland stone with a common secondary language of steel and solid oak, forming handrails, balustrades as well as brise soleil providing some shading.

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This material language is continued internally with a new dramatic stairwell spanning the 5 storeys – formed from a central steel balustrade with solid oak treads.  The handrail was handmade from turned wood, covered with tactile hand-stitched leather.  An oversized skylight at roof level above the staircase brings natural light deep into the plan, filtering into the living spaces below.

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Design of the living spaces included elements of bespoke joinery, a playful secret staircase and a complex arrangement of bi- and tri-folding, rotating doors that can disappear into wall linings to maximise the flexibility of the main living spaces.

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Project undertaken as McDowell+Benedetti

Photography by Grant Smith