The sensitive transformation and extension of a listed Georgian townhouse in a conservation area in Lambeth, south London, was done with the needs of two professional musicians in mind.
Here, Sue Böhling tells the story of how she and her husband, Robin O’Neill, worked with the studio to create a home and garden music room that are perfectly pitched for how they live and work.
“Music is about small details coming together to form a harmonious composition, and I think of this house – and architecture generally – in the same way. If you pay attention to the minutia, all the details come together to form a space that is a joy to live in.
“Robin and I are resident musicians at the Royal Festival Hall and our place before this was a large loft apartment on Westminster Bridge Road, not very far away.
“Being able to walk to work is really important to us so when it was time to leave the loft we began looking around Lambeth’s Walcot Estate, which comprises small terraced cottages arranged around two garden squares from the 1830s. It’s not very well known, but there is a strong sense of community among those who live here.
“I got Richard, one of the directors, over before we had even exchanged. I had seen a picture of one of the studio’s projects years ago in a magazine and I said to Robin, ‘If we ever do a full house renovation, it’s going to be with Paul Archer Design.’ I just loved the sense of light and space they had created in this glass box extension, and I always knew I wanted something similar.
We never imagined it to be so beautiful; my original sketch was more like a wooden shed! But Richard pushed the boundaries and created this warm, lovely space that looks especially beautiful at night when it’s lit up.
“I have vivid memories of sitting upstairs with Richard and talking it through. It really was pretty filthy back then, and we were sat on a rickety old sofa looking at how everything was falling apart. I said it would be a project we’d live in for a good long while, so we wanted to do it properly and get the house feeling robust and solid, with space and light maximised as much as possible.
“No one knew what an undertaking that would be. The front and back of the house were pulling away from each other, so we had to lay a new concrete slab, replace all the joists and reinforce the stairs. I had just trained as an interior designer before we started so I was naively confident going into the project, but once we found out we had to do all that structural work I was very glad to have Paul Archer Design’s expertise on side. We couldn’t have done any of that without them, not in a million years.
“Sorting out the structure – work that is completely invisible now – gave us a single level on the ground floor on which Richard designed a new infill extension, housing the kitchen-diner. It’s a north-facing space, but you would never know it with how much daylight comes in. Robin especially craves the light, and coming from the loft space, where we had three-metre-high windows, we were so thrilled to find that sense of airiness here.
“The kitchen floor runs out seamlessly to the garden and then forms a desk in the music studio. We never imagined it to be so beautiful; my original sketch was more like a wooden shed! But Richard pushed the boundaries and created this warm, lovely space that looks especially beautiful at night when it’s lit up.
“We were so lucky to move in just before the pandemic started. It was a heartbreaking time because Robin had spent four years planning a year long schedule of conducting and arranging music around the world. Those plans disappeared over night, and they were never coming back. So he sat in that studio for months and did the most incredible arrangement of some Bach, which he has just finished recording with a label that love it. The whole project came out of Robin having the studio, so it’s no understatement to say it saved him. But this house has changed both of our lives; it has given us the things we need to function and be happy.
