Garden House, Maenan, North Wales - Smith Brooke Architects

HISTORIC HALL, NORTH WALES

Conwy County, North Wales

2020-2022

Architects: Smith Brooke Architects
Contractor: Best Construction Ltd
Interior Design: Sarah Osmond Interiors
Photography: Jamie Thomson Photography

This garden house is set in the expansive gardens of an historic hall in Conwy, North Wales and is a Grade I listed building. The house was once a garage and subsequently a tearoom for visitors to the gardens with accommodation in the roof. The brief was to build a new bothy for the gardeners, doubled as a tearoom, freeing up the house to be extended into a three-bedroom house. This required an extension to give a symmetrical façade on either side of the entrance to the building, which has a gable with a roof behind at right angles to the remainder.

The building is a modest stone-built single storey affair, the gable facing the Hall has been worked on by Clough Williams Ellis. The extension was in stone to match, and new windows and doors were installed to match the Hall, which is 16th century with 18th and 20th century extensions. The landscaping levels around Garden House have been altered and new planting will soon establish itself.

Internally, the bedrooms and two bathrooms are on two levels over half the footprint. At the other end the double storey space has been retained to give a commodious kitchen/dining room and sitting room, connected visually to the study beyond and a bedroom above, where Gothic windows have been designed to increase the feeling of space in what is quite a tight footprint.

By retaining circular windows, stone finishes, trusses and arched stonework, the charm of the original structure has been preserved and the interior designing, in conjunction with Sarah Osmond, creates a comfortable family house with views in all directions of the landscape and majestic Conwy beyond.