DeDraft updates modernist home set within East Sussex garden

UK studio DeDraft has renovated the 1960s TH Residence in East Sussex, using a palette of warm wood and ceramic tiles to echo the home's original modernist character.

Located in Ditchling within the South Downs National Park, the sprawling red-brick home overlooks a landscaped garden with a pond and lake surrounded by trees.

TH Residence had been largely untouched since its completion in 1964, so its new owners tasked DeDraft with expanding its living spaces without impacting its original character, which the studio's director Grant Straghan described as "calm, low-slung and grounded".

DeDraft converted a former garage wing alongside the main dwelling into a home office and bedroom, uniting the two with a central, glazed infill to create an L-shaped pavilion-like form that hugs the garden.

"The clients' brief and our resultant concept for the remodel and expansion was very clear in that any new elements had to be true to the original modernist language of the house," Straghan told Dezeen.

"We sought to further reinforce the horizontal planes, framed views and material warmth of the 1960s design while carefully reworking and replacing elements to integrate them, ensuring that new interventions were coherent with the original architectural logic," he added.

"Given the strong forms and aesthetic, our key aim was to preserve the expansive footprint and use the replacement wing to wrap the garden, replacing the garage that was original to the plot."

The elbow-shaped central infill forms the new heart of TH Residence, connecting a two-storey entrance and bedroom block to the north, a large living and dining space to the east and a home office and additional bedroom to the south.

Within the infill, a formerly enclosed kitchen now occupies a light-filled space with a curved back wall, punctured by clerestory windows and containing a built-in bench.

Both this new central space and the southern wing continue the fully-glazed facade of the existing dining and living wing to the north, lined by a "connective spine" that gives the interior a close relationship to the garden via sliding doors.

"The retained ground-floor living and dining areas maintain their original pavilion-like quality, opening expansively in the summer months," said Straghan.

"Within the splayed extension wing, a new internal corridor forms a connective spine, offering framed views across the raised ponds and planting as one moves through the house," he added.

The material palette for the renovation was informed both by the existing 1960s home and the work of DeDraft's "design hero", the Finnish architect Alvar Aalto.

A curved wall alongside the entrance was clad in bespoke ceramic tiles while, internally, Douglas fir was used extensively for wall linings, ceilings and window frames, complementing the original Doussié wood window frames.

"Together, all these elements form a cohesive palette that subtly distinguishes old from new without visual discord," concluded Straghan.

DeDraft was founded by Straghan in 2010. Previous projects by the studio include a home in rural Oxfordshire that sits atop a plinth of local Cotswolds stone and a three-storey London extension clad in weathering steel.

The photography is by Jake Balston.

The post DeDraft updates modernist home set within East Sussex garden appeared first on Dezeen.