Solar Townhouse in London

Solid helix

The project aim was to turn the unique historic character of the existing 2-story solid masonry structure, as well as its compact neighborhood setting, into a design opportunity -creating an exemplary prototype for high-density, sustainable urban living.

Project Aim

The 210m2 townhouse is designed with the notion that ‘small is beautiful’, something that can be traced back to the early modernists of Europe and America who used this as a premise in their search for the most ergonomic and frugal housing unit. While their solutions leaned towards what is just enough to live comfortably, this proposal maximizes richness and complexity to create a 4-dimensional interplay of spaces linked across two eras in time and intricately crafted with shifts in movement, perspective, and materiality. The house’s manifold attachments to the adjacent structures and surrounding vegetation served as the guide to the proposed volumetric extrusions that establish an otherness within the existing context.

Design Morphology

The original structure is left intact to maintain the largely opaque building edges and serve as the foundational base for the new intervention. It is treated as the structural core, off of which a multi-faceted roof extension enveloping an additional story and other hovering projections emerges. The intersection between the folded zinc-and-glass envelope and the densely packed program within, generates several distinctly formed apertures such as the pyramidal skylight in the kitchen, a glass slit in the living room exposing what used to be a narrow rear yard, and a fully glazed window revealing the panoramic view of the streetscape below framed by an old-growth tree. The terrace at the roof level extends the kitchen and dining room toward the exterior and offers a moment of outdoor respite amidst the surrounding foliage and neighborhood roofscape.

Staircase Design

At the heart of the building is a custom-built winding stair that connects the entrance floor with the double-height living area above and the open kitchen-and-dining on the topmost level. The organic and fluid geometry of this solid-steel helix form connects all public areas of the house in one continuous sweep, thus creating a sculptural vortex of daylit space. Here, density and richness condense together to create a singular object that is both extremely efficient and strikingly beautiful. This stair embodies a uniquely sensible architectural gesture that marries design intelligence, manufacturing expertise, and dynamic form-optimization to go beyond mere problem-solving.

Materials & Sustainability

The sculptural corporality and rich textures of the interiors are a deliberate departure from the typically rationalist and frugal effect of compact dwellings. High-contrast black raw wood cladding and cabinetry, textured stone surfaces, and brass mosaics are highlighted by soft glowing light coves. Precious glass pendants elevate the interior atmosphere, while complementing the organically shaped wood furniture and natural wool rugs. Finally, the roof is lined with fully integrated PV panels that provide the almost off-the-grid building with baseline electricity sufficient to run heat pumps, hot water supply, lighting, as well as a 13kW Tesla battery to charge an electric car.