Alison Brooks wins 2021 Manser Medal – AJ House of the Year

This rework of an existing house and new extension, connecting out to a sequence of walled gardens, deeply impressed the judges as a ‘complete piece of architecture – beautifully executed and considered’.

The restoration and conversion of the late-Georgian Gloucestershire farmhouse into a gallery and office interlocks seamlessly with a new wing to the west. This contains a series of linked living spaces which extend out into further outdoor ‘rooms’ formed by the walled gardens and new pool pavilion, in what judges called ‘a wonderful topography’.

Two key drivers of the design coming from the brief were the celebration of the house’s landscape setting and its views out over the Wye Valley, and the provision for display of the owner’s extensive collection of Indian and African tribal art.

Consisting of continuous folded, planar elements, the extension is intended to echo the surrounding landscape, its dark-coloured cladding designed to be recessive, its form low-lying, connected to the earth.

‘Looks extraordinary yet snugly fits with the old language of the house and the surrounding landscape,’ said one judge. ‘Indeed, this is house as landscape.’

Internally, there’s a different landscape of niches, benches and recesses for the display of objects from the collection. ‘The spaces are lovely and beautifully detailed,’ said the judges. ‘Every little piece is really well thought through and put together painstakingly.’

To increase biodiversity, a large portion of the surrounding land has been planted with wildflower meadows and orchards while hedges have been repaired and renewed with pollen-rich species and 2,500 trees planted.

It exemplifies the long-term thinking and ‘patience’ of a scheme that has been 10 years in the making, one that was judged to have been a ‘real success story of a client and architect working together. The ambition and quality of the end result is wonderful.’

Highly commended: The Water Tower by Tonkin Liu

Source:Mike Tonkin

This house, a conversion from a disused Norfolk water-tower, was described by the judges as ‘brilliant and whimsical’ and commended as an example of ‘very clever and efficient’ retrofit.

The rusty steel water tank has been remade as the living room, a ribbon window cut in to offer expansive views out, creating a space the judges described as ‘marvellous’. Suspended below, two bedrooms and a ground-floor garden room were built as prefabricated CLT structures, connected via glazed bridges to a new CLT stair tower. The latter acts as a compression spiral, funnelling wind loads to the foundation and minimising the thickness of the timber walls.

‘Designed very efficiently and frugally – there are no extras,’ said the judges. ‘It deals with site and budget  constraints in a wonderful and responsible way.

‘A project of passion. Simplicity and honesty resonate throughout: it shows how reuse can be elegant.’

Shortlist

• House on the End by 1200 Works
• Corner House by 31/44 Architects
• Lower Tullochgrue by Brown & Brown Architects
• Grain House by Hayhurst and Co
• House in Bearsden by McGinlay Bell
• Devon Passivhaus by McLean Quinlan
• Bouverie Mews Artist Compound by Spatial Affairs Bureau
• Redhill Barn by TYPE

Judges

• Ben Addy, managing director, Moxon Architects
• Ollie Chapman, director, Oliver Chapman Architects
• Tanvir Hasan, deputy chairman, Donald Insall Architects
• Adiam Sertzu, associate director, AKT II