Elizabeth Mews
The project comprises of a garage conversion and ground floor refurbishment of a courtyard house on a quiet cobbled mews in Primrose Hill, North London. The Client's brief entailed the conversion of the under-utilised and uninsulated garage at the front of the property in order to provide much-needed habitable space for her young family to live laterally across one level. This opening up of the floorplan and street facing frontage presented the opportunity to meaningfully improve on the interior's daylight, cross-ventilation and outlook.
Elizabeth Mews falls within the Belsize Park Conservation Area which means that any proposed street-facing alterations needed to be carefully considered so as to not harm the existing character of the mews.The repeating panelled garage doors are a legacy from the mews' origins as stabling and coach accommodation, and remain a key contributor to its overall character. Therefore from the outset it was felt most appropriate to sensitively repurpose the existing door opening.
The garage door was reimagined as an oak finned insert, which was developed to reconcile the competing considerations of admitting daylight and ventilation into the home whilst providing privacy screening and solar shading. When viewed from the gateway to the mews, the flutter of fins retain an impression of solidity which unravels like turning pages on approach. This playful choreography of planes, volumes and edges recalls the plywood sculptures of artist Donald Judd. The sculptural simplicity of the overall carpentry composition was achieved by concealed restraint fixings, tightly abutting joints, a unifying white oil finish and frameless detailing of the glazing. Set back behind the central fins, this glazing unit can tilt as a window for cross-ventilation, or turn inwards as a door to allow the family cat to venture out.
This approach respects the established fenestration order of the mews, whilst offering a quietly dignified evolution of its character. The enlivened frontage contributes greater visual animation, passive surveillance and illumination to the neighbourhood. The hope is for the project to set a positive precedent for other neighbours to follow suit with their own garage conversions and continue this incremental revitalisation of the ground level street scene.
Internally, the ground floor plan is re-organised on its front-back axis along a 9m long galley kitchen spanning the full depth of the property. Towards the rear, the kitchen expands into a dining area, before contracting into a small snug seating area beyond. The linear plan form and opening of the street frontage enables dual-aspect daylighting and cross ventilation from both the street at the front and an existing sheltered courtyard to the rear. A central dividing wall helps structure the space whilst providing tall storage and screening to the entrance hall, WC and staircase.
A minimalist spirit runs through a calm, contemplative interior defined by tonal and textural nuances that help the space to read as a uniform whole. Central to this is a specialist Danish plaster, which unifies walls and ceiling with a fabric-like surface suggesting undefined textiles. A cloudy white Mugla marble worktop stretches effortlessly along the full depth of the property linking street to courtyard. The stone’s weighty edge establishes a visual hierarchy over the delicate pressed metal shelf above. These two linear elements are separated by a band of Carrara flecked terrazzo tiles. Colour is used sparingly, but with precision. The rosy warmth of the Douglas Fir planks is complimented by the brushed copper accents, the mottled burgundy leaves of the Acer Palmatum Fireglow and rose quartz cushions to the snug.
A minimal frame pivot door is carefully detailed from floor to ceiling, enabling an unencumbered transition between interior and courtyard. This toplit chamber serves as a lightwell drawing in daylight to the rear of the property. The external space is loosely structured by a pair of simple geometric forms: a planar bench and cylindrical pot. The bespoke pot is handmade from Ecocrete (a recycled cementitious based material) in a bone white finish with lightly brushed strata and topped with white limestone chippings. The combination harmonises with the large format concrete tiles lining the floor and natural clay plaster adorning the walls.
