The exterior of this seaside house is made from imulating render and untreated western red cedar cladding. Natural oils in the wood will keep it looking good despite the salty air

The living area looks straight out over the water through sliding glass doors with ultra-thin frames . Project architect Car! Gulland designed the polished concrete hearth and blockwork fireplace Sl/1'/'0Und

Although decidedly modem, the house takes its design we from neighbouring jlat-mofed beach houses. Placing the upperjloor at 90" to the ground floor prevents it from obstmcting the 11eighbours' views, while a slotted screen provides privacy for the study

Want to know the secret to saving money on your

build? 'Leg work,' says Dawn Pooley, who, with

husband Jonathan, cut the cost of their home by

at least £60,000 thanks to those two magic words.

'You have to spend lots of time on the phone, talking to people,

reading up on things, and you've got to be a bit bloody minded.

There are not many people building bespoke houses at the

moment, so it 's a buyer's market. Don't forget that.'

Dawn had at least three quotes for everything, and up to

eight for the kitchen appliances and downstairs windows. She

also found affordable alternatives to more bespoke details. The

internal cedar cladding, for example, was meant to have a gap

between each slat, with black board behind it to accentuate the

wood, but Dawn achieved a similar look- and saved thousands

on the labour cost of lining up each slat- by having the wood

1t like shiplap, which slots together easily. Likewise, by

orking with a local cabinetmaker, Dawn was able to design

1d build a bespoke kitchen for a fraction of the cost of a

·p-end manufacturer's equivalent.

'You have to know your budget, be honest about it, and stick

it,' she says- though she adds that it's equally important not

go for the lowest price all the time. 'We had a couple of prices

r the external render that were• significantly lower than others,

td after seeing their work we knew why. We didn't use them.'

Dawn and J onathan, who runs a stationery and giftware

tsiness, bought the plot in 2005, and started building their

rrent house in October 2009, finishing it in July 2010. The

ver of land overlooking Chichester harbour was perfect for

em- they're both keen windsurfers- but the brick Thirties

>Use it came with was not, so after three winters with rain

seeping inside closed windows, they decided to knock it down

and build anew. 'We thought we would remodel a little, but

the more we looked into it, we realised it would always be a

compromise, and could easily turn into a bigger - and more

expensive- project than a new-build,' says Dawn.

'We threw some great summer parties on tl1e roof terrace of

tl1e old house, and because it faced east, we could watch the sun

and the moon rise across the water- beautiful. So we wanted to

keep all this, and turn up the experience a bit.'

To do this, they hired John Pardey Architects, after looking

at a number of practices through the RIBA and inviting three

to visit the site.

'John Pardey was the only practice that seemed to understand

the site, and the only one that, when invited, wanted to walk

around the harbour to see how the house sits in its location,' ~

GRAND DESIGNS I APRIL 2012 I 89

---=;;::::=;;._~1

Dawn has fitted out the interior with a muted colour scheme to match the western red cedar ceiling and D ouglas jirjlo01: She made the dining table out of jloorboards and found the BAC dining chairs by Jasper Morrison for Cappellini in a warehouse clearance sale

pi ~ Dawn and Jonathan 's house is laid out upside down with three bedrooms and en suites plus a utility room on the groun<;J floor and an open-plan kitchen/ dining/living area on the first f loor, along w ith a study and large terrace

90 I GRAND DESIGNS I APRIL 2012

I

! ,r I ---L--~-' -=-~~~

N

\

~~~~ Dawn !md a local binetmaker to :i/d her Corian !chm. 1 love the !chen. The whole ?cess of creating was a joy. I really t involved in the rign to create my ~am kitchen. And ing to a specialist 1inetmaker is not expensive as you ght imagine'

says Dawn. 'And the fact that many of them are mad-keen

windsmfers reassmed us that they understood what we wanted.'

Dawn and Jonathan kept the brief open, giving the architects

pictures of beach houses they liked, but not a lot else. 'We didn't

give them a design, because that's what they do, and chances are,

they would come up with something we hadn't thought of,' says

Dawn -which is exactly what happened.

The daring, cantilevered design rose from the ashes of a more

conservative initial plan (sans cantilever) that was rejected by

planners. John Pardey Architects drew up the second design while

the first design was going tlu-ough an appeal, and eventually

managed to get permission for both- but it took two years.

'Often planning officers tell us they love our designs, but can't

be seen to encourage modern architecture,' says project architect

HOMES Coastal New-Build

Carl Gulland. 'I hope that the Government's planned

National Planning Policy Framework will make tl'lings

easier. If the current system had been in place at the time of

Charles Rennie Mackintosh or Edwin Lutyens, we would

have n'lissed out on many ama~ing houses.'

The ground floor fills the width of the site, giving the tlu-ee

bedrooms a sea view and direct garden access, while the top

floor is set at a 90• angle to cantilever towards the harbour. Tl'lis

creates a long living space and a sizable rooftop terrace beside

the kitchen. There is also a basement to store sporting

equipment, and a separate entrance to a shower room at the

front, for washing off sand after coming off the beach.

Inside, the house feels simultaneously sheltered from

and at one witl1 its location. It 's inspired by n'lid-century

~

el·u• Each bedroom has its own en-suite bathroom fitted with sleek, minimal sanita1yware

92 I GRAND DESIGNS I APRIL 2012

this J1i1:ture AU the bedrooms have a sea view thanks to being positioned side­by-side in a row downstairs. The bed was designed by Dawn and made by the carpenter who installed the cedar cladding

Scandinavian houses, with dark wood-clad walls and light

flooring- an inverse of the light walls and dark flooring found

in most contemporary homes. 'It makes the living area feel like

a really secure, protected space,' says Car!.

The lines of the cedar cladding and Douglas fir floorboards

(cut 9.5m long to stretch from the kitchen out to the balcony)

also help draw the eye out towards show-stopping views

across the harbour, and there's plenty of natural light from

the terrace on one side, the glazed stairwell on the other, and

the sliding balcony doors, which have a thin frame for an

unobstructed view.

'You can wake up early, sit in the swivel chair and slide the

glass doors back, watching the sky turn from black to purple to

pink, then blue, and just take a deep breath as the day begins,'

says Dawn. ~d with a house full of friends laughing and

dancing, andJonathan grilling lobster on the barbecue, the

house really comes into its own.'

In fact, D awn andJonathan love the house so much- and the

process of building it- that they've caught the bug, and are now

hunting for a new project on Guernsey. Dawn has also turned

her talent for getting a good deal into a new career managing

other people's projects.

'It's great helping people achieve their budgets. Money is so

tight on the project I'm currently working on, so getting savings

means the difference between them building their house or not.'

And as their Chichester house shows, careful cost-cutting

doesn't have to compromise good design- the two can exist

together. And that's priceless, no matter what your budget.

Turn to p95 for furnishings and accessories in ~ Dawn and Jonathan's Scandinavian-themed style KEf

Demolition, groundwork and foundations £39,000 Steel frame £27,000 Roofing £36,000 Cladding £12,000 Glazing £60,000 Plumbing and electrics £15,000 Air source heat pump £18,000 Total build cost £450,000 Total build cost per sqm £2,227 Current estimated value £1 m+

St,vph.:,J M Architect John

Pardey Architects (01590 626 465; johnpardeyarchitects.com) Project management Dawn Pooley (07786 220 266; dawnreid.co.uk) Structural engineer Ramboll (01962 842 478; ramboll.co.uk) Builder Andrews Building (01243 375 923; andrewsbuilding.co.uk)

Western red cedar cladding Covers, Chichester (01243 785 141; covers.biz) Insulating render Alsecco (01785 818 998; alsecco.co.uk) Staircase glazing and balustrades Clear Living (01925 211 430; clear-living. co.uk) Thin-frame sliding doors Skyframe (+41 52 369 0230; sky-frame.com) Ground floor glazing and doors Ratione! (01869 248 181; rationel.co.uk) 1:• :l Air source heat pump Danfoss (0114 270 3900; ecoheatpumps.co.uk)

11 :fS ,NI T IN Kitchen Krahwork (07899 846 301; kraftwork.co.uk) Kitchen appliances Miele (0845 365 6600; miele.co.uk) Kitchen taps Holloways of Ludlow (020 7602 5757; hollowaysofludlow.com) Internal cladding Covers, Chichester (as before) Douglas fir flooring Dinesen (+45 7455 2140; dinesen.com) Ceramic floor tiles Ceramiche Caesar (020 7836 4662; caesar.it) Bathroom basins Aston Matthews (020 7226 7220; astonmatthews.co.uk) WCs Starck 3 wall-hung by Duravit (0845 500 7787; duravit.com) :uRNITUF Sofas Andrew Nebbet

(020 7723 2303; andrewnebbett. com); Danish Homestore (0115 948 4428; danish-homestore.com) Dining chairs BAC chair by Jasper Morrison for Cappellini, available at Nest (0114 243 3000; nest.co.uk) Swivel armchair Andrew Nebbet (as before) Kitchen blinds Silent Gliss (01843 863 571; si lentgliss. co.uk) Bookcase Kraftwork (as before)