Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic “There are ways to rethink old buildings imaginatively, without being disrespectful,” says Neil Davies. “When you get it right, you actually make the original building sing and you give it another lease of life.”The founder of Neil Davies Architects is talking about the merits of contemporary additions to historic houses. There are an estimated 500,000 structures in the UK listed by government agencies as having historic or architectural merit. The majority of them are homes. The fact their owners double as custodians of a small piece of the nation’s built heritage does not mean listed houses cannot be altered or added to. But extensions need permission, usually from a local authority conservation department.It might seem that the easiest way to gain permission would be to copy the existing fabric, whether it is stone, brick or timber and wattle and daub. But online guidance from the government heritage agency Historic England advises a contrasting design is often the best way to go as it preserves the “legibility” of the older structure. Will Hathaway, director of Cotswold-based Eastabrook Architects, says the easy option for a contemporary extension to a listed home was once to build a glass box. Fishtank-like structures pleased council conservation officers by almost disappearing against the original structure. Climate change and net zero carbon emissions targets have curbed that enthusiasm. “Overheating is now a big consideration,” he says. “And thermal comfort and glare.” An extension has to satisfy not only heritage requirements but also building regulations, which set increasingly high standards for energy efficiency.Nevertheless Eastabrook, which has built hundreds of extensions since it was founded in 1985, secured permission for a glazed addition to a Grade ll-listed house in an Oxfordshire village. The house comprises three former workers’ cottages knocked together. In its back courtyard, Eastabrook’s 300 sq ft addition, completed in 2020, is a flat-roofed box with glass walls. Planning requirements for energy efficiency were met by heavily insulating the roof, adding deep eaves to provide solar shading and improving the insulation in the rest of the house as an offset for the glazed expanses.Though resolutely modern, the new building nods to the old. The 3ft-wide steel-framed glass panels are an echo of the smaller Crittall windows in the main house. A steel column supporting the new roof was clad in reclaimed Cotswold stone to match the cottage walls. “It’s simple and clean,” says David Golding, who commissioned Eastabrook. “It adds space and light, it looks complementary, it’s warm and practical. I think it works in every dimension.”Proposals most likely to gain a sympathetic hearing from heritage officers will be single-storey, respect the original floor plan and not too big, says Richard MacCullagh, principal at the historic environment consultants RMA Heritage and a former local government conservation officer. Some authorities limit extensions to a set percentage of the original house. South Downs National Park and New Forest National Park, for example, set a 30 per cent limit on the increase in size of the structure.Hathaway says the best way to smooth the path is via pre-application engagement — an informal submission of the plans and often a meeting with the officer dealing with the case. Some local authorities charge nothing for pre-apps but others ask for fees up to £1,000. Hathaway says this is money well spent; face-to face contact helps architect and client establish their bona fides and reassure the conservation officer that they respect the existing structure. “We’re probably 60 per cent more likely to get a favourable outcome,” he says. “It’s a negotiation, and the human element is important.”Chris Romer-Lee is another fan of pre-apps. The founder of London-based architects Studio Octopi recently finished a bold, angled, mint-green steel-clad extension to a Grade ll early-1800s house. Wedged in a triangular site between a pub and a Georgian terrace in the capital’s south-eastern suburb of Blackheath, the house had been expanded at some point to incorporate a saddlemaker’s workshop.Romer-Lee met Lewisham Council’s conservation officer armed with a 72-page report commissioned from a heritage consultancy about the history of the house. “The councils don’t have enough resources to allow someone to do a day’s research into a property before going to visit it,” he says. Doing the investigative work to save the officer the effort helps keep them on side.The quid pro quo Studio Octopi offered the council for such a contrasting intervention — its cool steel, glass, terrazzo and granite finishes pop against the red brick of the rear facade — was to renovate that facade. They removed unsightly UPVC downpipes, softened 20th-century changes to the windows to make them appear more period appropriate, and repointed the brickwork in lime mortar. “[The conservation officer] loved the fact that we were going to restore this back elevation,” Romer-Lee says. One way to ease conservation concerns is to detach the extra space from your historic property. Former television executive Sue Oriel lives in a Grade ll-listed timber-framed house built in the early 17th century, which borders arable fields near Faversham in Kent. In 2021, Davies dropped what he describes as a 470 sq ft “stealth bomber” of a garden studio. Davies dropped what he describes as a 470 sq ft ‘stealth bomber’ of a garden studioOriel’s instructions to Davies were: “I want to feel I’m outside, I want it to be quite big and I want the wow factor.”She says he granted all three wishes. The studio sweeps up dramatically towards the cottage’s gable end. Its black-tarred weatherboard cladding references the outhouses and lean-tos added to houses in the area in previous centuries. That and the quality of the design and materials swayed the conservation officer at Swale Borough Council in favour of the design. It also helped that the plot proposed for the studio was occupied by an unlovely breezeblock double garage. “If we hadn’t had that we might have had a real problem getting it this close to the house,” says Oriel. The airy space is a counterpoint to the low-ceilinged, cosy rooms of the main house. “I will be here as often as I possibly can, in any season,” she adds. If future generations do not share her enthusiasm, the studio, and most modern additions, can be removed or replaced. If they do continue to find favour, they may become as much a part of the built heritage as the houses they complement.Find out about our latest stories first — follow @FTProperty on X or @ft_houseandhome on Instagram
