Alltogether, six roof windows – three in each roof surface – provide the rooms in the upper level with daylight. Intensely patterned wall covering, an exception in the house, provides visual coherence of the staircase.
Alltogether, six roof windows – three in each roof surface – provide the rooms in the upper level with daylight. Intensely patterned wall covering, an exception in the house, provides visual coherence of the staircase.
Black and slender
The region of Ely in the English County of Cambridgeshire north of London is characterised by the drained moor landscape of the “Cambridgeshire Fens” and many old country barns with dark cement-based fibre board exteriors, which all seem as if a giant had rolled the dice on a flat surface.
Their exterior has been adapted by architect Meredith Bowles for his design of the “Black House” in Prickwillow: the entire façade and the roof are clad in black corrugated cement-based fibre board siding. The vertically applied siding makes the slender proportions of the house seem yet more slender and tall, emphasised by the fact that the house is built on stilts.
The dominant colour black of the façade is interrupted by windows and doors in varying sizes, the colours of which provide a playful accentuation. Only exceptions are the roof windows, which adapt to the dark building exterior. The building interiors present themselves as unexpectedly light, illuminated with natural light in abundance through the windows, arranged according to the movement of the sun and the view of the exterior. A central core consisting of kitchen, bathrooms and staircase is surrounded by living room and bedrooms as well as Meredith Bowles’ architectural office “Mole Architects”.
Colour accentuations in green and pink continue the ideas present in the façade into the interior. The building, having received the RIBA Award 2004, among other awards, consists to a large part of recyclable materials and is equipped with a heat exchange unit, using the warm air vented from the interiors to pre-heat the fresh air intake and hot water.
The Black Housestands out from the rest of the village. However, the architecture of the building is nevertheless inspried by regional examples, most notably the country barns of the Cambridgeshire Fens.
Vertically applied siding consisting of corrugated cement-based fibreboard underscores the slimness of the building. The horizontals are highlighted by the mullion covering the butt joints of the fibreboard panels.
Alltogether, six roof windows – three in each roof surface – provide the rooms in the upper level with daylight. Intensely patterned wall covering, an exception in the house, provides visual coherence of the staircase.
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