Our clients live in a 1930s house in Balham with their two young sons. One half of the couple had been raised in a modernist house in Belgium, surrounded by a collection of 20th Century Art while the other grew up in a mountainous region of Switzerl

Collage House

BALHAM, SOUTH LONDON

For this project, the renovation of a 1930s house, we approached our clients holistically, looking at the family’s living patterns, and making only the most economical structural changes. We considered who they are as people, and where they had grown up themselves – one half of the couple had been raised in a modernist house in Belgium, surrounded by a collection of 20th Century Art; while the other grew up in mountainous Switzerland – this knowledged shaped our conception of their growing family home.

Aesthetically, the project has been conceived as a collage; a rich mix of strongly-contrasting colours and textures creating a warmly tactile environment. In the kitchen, rough painted brickwork meets crisp plasterwork, black glass, stainless steel and grained wood. These provide the backdrop to carefully-selected pieces of contemporary and mid-century Danish furniture, set against heated polished concrete floors. Particular noteworthy details include the laser-cut timber ‘Corral’ lamp hanging over the dining table – designed and made in-house by Liddicoat & Goldhill.