With its headquarters in London and offices overseas, Merchant Bridge is a leading investment firm in oil and gas industries and financial services. The firm occupies the second floor of a 1960s office block and commissioned Paul McAneary Architects to refurbish and reorganise the interior.

The aim was to rationalise the space, but also instill visual interest. Cellular offices are grouped around an open plan area, with glazed partition walls enhancing a sense of connection. Storage, copying and IT areas are tucked into interstitial spaces, ensuring that offices are kept clear of clutter. Small details, such as rounded corners to the non-glazed partition walls, add finesse.

A feature wall of striated stone forms a focal point, its alternately rough and smooth strata alluding to the notion of geological exploration for oil. As one of Paul McAneary Architects’s earliest projects, Merchant Bridge acted as test bed for future work, showing how thoughtful details can elevate an apparently modest commercial interior. [By Catherine Slessor*]

Contract Value £150k

Location Knightsbridge, London

Client Merchant Bridge

Date 2009

Area 316m²

Design Team Paul McAneary Architects

Design Service Interior design, FF&E, building control, lighting design

Supplier Mint

On a challenging corner site in a London conservation area, this project reinterprets the typology of the suburban house to create a new, ecologically responsive dwelling. Experimenting with formal and spatial possibilities, the main volume is aggregated and intersected by two smaller volumes, resulting in a complex, angular roofscape.

Planes of dark brick and frameless glass give the remodelled house a geometrically precise, clean-lined appearance, enhanced by concealed gutters and utilities. Based on Passivehaus design principles, the project is a bold and considered response to the idea of sustainable living.

Environmental control measures include the use of solar panels, a ground source heat pump, highly insulated building fabric and grey water recycling. Technology works in tandem with carbon neutral buildings materials to reduce energy and maintenance costs, providing an efficient and potentially replicable model for a modern, sustainable house. [By Catherine Slessor*]

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Design Team Paul McAneary Architects

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Awards

Exhibitions

Press 2016 Sumit Singhal, ‘Pitch- Gable House in London, England by Paul McAnea Architects’, AECCafe, 15 May 2016

Developing the idea of furniture as microcosmic architecture, the Paul McAneary Architects box bed resembles a room in miniature. Made from walnut with a white lacquer finish, its hyper-chunky structure dramatically reconceptualises the classic four poster form.

The bed frame is integrated with entertainment technology for an ultra sensuous and sybaritic experience. The idea originally came from a client who wanted a modern version of a four poster bed and this formed the starting point for development by the practice into a truly distinctive piece of contemporary furniture. [By Catherine Slessor*]

Date Ongoing

Design Team Paul McAneary Architects

This bold remodelling of an Edwardian terraced house within a conservation area in London’s Hammersmith, reconceptualises the conventional notion of the domestic extension. The client requested a contemporary design that blurred the distinction between inside and out, with the garden becoming a continuation of the dwelling space.

Paul McAneary Architects response was to devise an elongated, pavilion-like volume with a 30 degree angle on plan where it meets the garden. Channelling natural light into the interior, this single-storey volume is terminated by a full height glass wall with sliding glass doors held within a crisply faceted zinc facade.

The paved floor of the new extension projects beyond the external wall line to create an outdoor deck, its sharply chamfered profile finessing the transition into the garden. The previously compartmented ground floor of the house is now opened up into a single fluid space, cultivating a sense of physical and perceptual overlapping between indoor and outdoor realms.

Bathed in natural light, the new kitchen-living area expands and transforms the external landscape, while lush planting surrounds and perceptively invades the domestic space through the glass wall and a frameless glass skylight.

Exploring a formal language of solid and void, together with a palette of natural materials designed to improve with age, this project has a rigour and refinement that beautifully demonstrates the transformative potential of architectural imagination. [By Catherine Slessor*]

Contract Value £140k
Location Hammersmith & Fulham, London
Client Private
Date 2008 – 2009
Area 185m²
Design Team Paul McAneary Architects
Design Service Architectural, interior, lighting, kitchen, electrical & mechanical design services, planning consultants/applications, final concept to project completion
Main Contractor Sheppard Construction
Sub Contractor First Glaze Direct
Supplier Rheinzink, Vola, Royal Mosa Tiles
Press 2014 ‘A Contemporary Extension by Paul McAneary Architects’, Contemporist, 26 August 2014, Lindsay Blair, ‘Small Extensions’, Real Homes, August 2014 2013‘Extend your Home’, Grand Designs, July 2013, Jo Messenger, ‘Kitchen Extension’, Real Homes, January 2013, BD New Architects 2013, 2012 Carolina Calzada, ‘SBID International Design Awards – Residential Sector’, SBID, November 2012, Ideal Home, ’Extreme Transformation’, January 2012, The Sourcebook of Contemporary Houses, 2011 Marcelo Seferin, ‘Architect Day: Paul McAneary Architects’, Abuzeedo, 13 September 2011, ’Faceted House 1 by Paul McAneary Architects’, AArchitecture, September 2011, Erika Kim, ‘paul mcaneary architects: tex tonic house 1’, designboom, 27 July 2011, ‘Faceted House 1’, ArchiTonic, July 2011, Claudia Rada, ’Faceted House 1’, Architext, March-April 2011, Alex Nikjoo, ‘Faceted House 1, Hammersmith, London by Paul McAneary Architects’, Architects Journal, 3 February 2017, ’Extensions Special’, Grand Designs, February 2011 ‘Faceted House 1 von Paul McAneary Architects Ltd’, Studio 5555, 25 January 2011, RIBA London Directory 2011, RIBA Interiors Directory 2011, 2010 ’Like New Paul McAneary Architects’, Projectar Casa, December 2010, Laura Galimberti, ‘The garden between the walls’, Design Diffusion News, December 2010, ’Briaunuotas namas’, Centras, December 2010, ’Faceted House 1’, WhoWithWhat.com, October 2010, ’Contemporary Design Faceted House 1 in Hammersmith, London by Paul McAneary Architects’, 20th September 2010, ’Faceted House 1 by Paul McAneary Architects’, architeria.com., 20 September 2010, ’Faceted House 1 by Paul McAneary Architects’, Art you know, September 2010, David McManus, ‘Faceted House, London’, e-architect, 2 June 2010
Awards 2012 SBID – Won Best Residential Space Planning Award 2010 Design Awards – Won Living Space Design of the Year
Exhibitions 2010 New London Architecture ‘Don’t Move, Improve!’

As one of Paul McAneary Architects’ early projects, this remodelling of a Victorian house in Kensal Green explored the idea of optimising space and light to create an airy, clean-lined contemporary home, a theme that continues to underscore the practice’s work.

The project focused on opening up the cellular arrangement of the dwelling with an efficient looping plan, hence the name ‘Loop House’. Bespoke Paul McAneary Architects storage units effectively clear rooms of clutter, revealing new spatial possibilities, and a toplit staircase brings natural light into the interior. In a deft sleight of hand, an existing unsound flat roof to the rear of the house was reconstituted as a sculptural parabolic form, an especially complex feat of design and construction incorporating concealed gutters.

The clients enjoy entertaining, so dining and kitchen spaces were enlarged and the connection with the garden enhanced, to take advantage of al fresco possibilities. A new pergola trained with luxuriant climbing plants offers shade in the heat of the summer, transforming the garden into a sensual outdoor room. [By Catherine Slessor*]

Contract Value Private

Location North West London

Client Ceilidh & Will Waddington

Date 2008

Area 167m²

Design Team Paul McAneary Architects

Design Service

Main Contractor Typhoon

Sub Contractor

Supplier Aston-Mathews, Hicks Jo Powell Blinds, Somic

Press 2011 Channel 4 with George Clark

Involving an unorthodox brief to house ten tortoises and a client eager to commission an exemplar of ecologically responsive design, this project synthesises form and materials to create a compact yet highly striking structure. Occupying a garden site in Northern Ireland, it takes the form of a 2.8m high curved stone wall that defines and conceals the tortoise house. Bands of roughly chipped sandstone varying in depth and length powerfully express the thickness and texture of the stone. Drip details are deliberately omitted, so the wall will evolve over time in a natural and beautiful way,

Beyond the wall, the tortoise house is constructed from highly insulated timber walls and a frameless, triple-glazed roof. The refined, frameless glass detail creates the illusion of an enclosure open to the sky, maximising light and warmth. Treated glass prevents overheating. Within the minimal interior, a streamlined kitchen provides a food preparation and bathing area for the tortoises. Underfloor heating is controlled by a thermostat to maintain an optimum temperature all year round.

The walls of the enclosure are clad in cedar slats treated and protected by charring, a technique based on traditional Japanese construction. The cedar is allowed to burn until it is blackened and charred, effectively sealing it without the need for chemical treatments which can damage the environment. Employed for the first time in the UK, the technique results in a long-lasting and visually alluring finish. Elegant bronze detailing protects the cedar and counterpoints the rich tones of the wood.

The combination of rough stone and smooth burnt timber gives the building a distinctive presence that merges with the garden landscape while providing a functional enclosure for its venerable reptilian residents. As tortoises are famous for their longevity, the project is also an apt manifestion of Paul McAneary Architects philosophy of wabi sabi, in which elements are subtly transmuted through age and use. [By Catherine Slessor*]

Contract Value Private
Location Nothern Ireland
Client Private
Date 2010 – 2011
Area 8m²
Design Team Paul McAneary Architects
Design Service From design concept to detailed design to the end of construction, interior design, lighting design, glazing design, landscape design, structural design, material creation, survey, planning, building control, 3D visualisation
Main Contractor L. S. Construction
Supplier The Plank Co, Top Glass, Thomas Rooney & Sons Ltd, Rathbanna Limited
Press 2013 BD New Architects 2013, 2010 ‘Masonary Overview’, AJ Specification, November 2010
Awards 2012 Surface Design Awards – Highly Commended for Housing Exterior Surface Award

The focus of this residential remodelling is a new roof terrace enclosed by a beautifully constructed timber balustrade. Gaining planning permission for roof terraces in urban areas can be difficult because of issues of privacy and overlooking.

In this case, the inventive solution is to create a custom-designed balustrade of slim vertical timber members that preserves privacy while still conveying a sense of light and views. The simple but effective concept of a vertical timber screen as a veiling element is employed in other projects, including the practice’s own office.

Acting like an outdoor room and lined with timber, the new roof terrace extends the existing dwelling, providing a flexible and delightful external space for relaxing and entertaining. [By Catherine Slessor*]

Contract Value Private

Location North West London

Client Private

Date 2009

Area 158m²

Design Team Paul McAneary Architects

Design Service

Main Contractor Sheppard Construction

Sub Contractor

Supplier

This commission arose through Paul McAneary Architects’ experience of working in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, an exclusive enclave of west London. Paul McAneary Architects’s reputation for high quality residential design spread by word-of-mouth and the practice was invited to remodel a house belonging to one of the UK’s leading pop stars.

The large Regency dwelling had a garden and mews, which had been converted into a recording studio. The focus of the remodelling is an expanded roof zone to accommodate an enlarged master bedroom with en suite bathroom. The new roof is a version of a standard mansard, inventively customised and reconceptualised by Paul McAneary Architects for this particular context.

Within its folded form, like a delicate piece of origami, carefully positioned skylights bring natural light into the spaces below. Mindful of planning constraints, the project had to be executed with great tact and sensitivity in negotiation with local planners, a challenged that drew on the practice’s considerable experience of working with existing historic buildings.

[By Catherine Slessor*]

Tex-Tonic House 1&2:

The client is passionate about gardening and vegetation.Therefore we designed a 21 metre long vertical living wall: a self-contained and irrigated planting system incorporating ‘acid yellow’, green and white planting scheme. The long horizontal curtain walling maximises the perception of spacial continuity between the interior and the exterior so that the external roof garden becomes a vital ingredient of the internal living space.