Monkton house
Sandy Rendel Architects have completed a new four-bedroom house, designed for a self-build client, on a brownfield site within the modern fringe of the historic village of Cuckfield in West Sussex. The new dwelling replaces a dilapidated bungalow that had reached the end of its serviceable life and had been poorly adapted and extended in the 1970s.
It is tucked onto a narrow 70-metre-long plot behind the main high street, with distant views to the Downs and backing onto the expanse of the old village brick fields to the south. It is designed to be physically robust, flexible in use, and sensitive to its varied context.
The piecemeal fringe development of this part of the village provides no clear grain to work from, with a wide range of styles and typologies making up the immediate context. Although developed around and after our site, it seems to have paid little regard to it, and as a result the proximity and awkward relationship to these neighbouring properties, along with the natural topography, have been key drivers in the form and massing of our design.
The long south-facing site has a 4-metre fall from Ardingly Road at its northern end to the bottom of the garden to the south. The house follows this slope, gradually stepping down the hill and offering increasingly generous ceiling heights as you move deeper into the principal living spaces.
At ground floor, the house is laid out as a simple rectilinear plan that is cut into around the perimeter to bring sunlight and daylight deeper into the plan and provide sheltered external spaces. Out of this plinth rise three bedroom “towers” at first floor, each accessed by its own private stair to provide distinct private territories for the parents and their grown-up children.
With their simple mono-pitch roofs oriented in different directions, they break down the scale and mass of the building at the upper floor. Their separation allows each to benefit from a dual aspect with views over the garden, whilst preventing any overlooking or loss of privacy for the adjacent properties on the east and west boundaries.
At the entrance, a covered external link connects the body of the main house to a separate single-storey garage/annexe wing, which frames the entrance yard.
The house has been designed to suit a simple and pragmatic construction approach and is built from a palette of robust self-finished materials that will weather naturally, develop character, and reflect the tonal and textural qualities of the predominantly red clay bricks and tiles of the surroundings.
Externally, a waterstruck soft red brick, laid in gritty lime mortar, is accented with precast concrete elements and the crisp detailing of the copper roofs. Internally, the layout allows clear structural paths and is zoned by different treatments of the ceilings, with areas of exposed Douglas fir joists, the walls, including the painted brick drums of the spiral stairs, and structure, including a bespoke cruciform steel column.
The design incorporates an air source heat pump and a whole-house MVHR system, as well as a high-performance envelope, to support a fabric-first approach to energy use. Though the house achieved an EPC B rating at completion, a photovoltaic array with battery storage, deferred due to budgetary constraints, is scheduled to be installed this year, which will raise the energy performance to an A rating.
The building has a long-life, loose-fit strategy as a series of generous, simple spaces whose function is flexible enough to suit the changing needs of the owners or future residents. This includes a ground-floor bedroom and a separate annexe, connected to the main house by a covered external walkway, that can accommodate a variety of functions, ranging from the current home office and gym to a possible small Airbnb.
It has been a drawn-out construction process, beginning during Covid and fitting around the availability of funds and the client’s other work.
