Horringer Road, Bury St Edmunds

Horringer Road is a five-bedroom dwelling set close to the centre of the historic town of Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk. The dwelling has been re-worked over the years with an undersized and uninspired ground floor rear extension which awkwardly plugged on to the back of the house. As a result, this created some underlit internal spaces with poorly defined functional identities and inadequate room proportions. The clients brief was to remove the existing extension with the view to creating a new contemporary extension. Introducing increased levels of natural light was of high importance, as was the need to create spaces which were well proportioned and suitably geared towards modern day living requirements.

The new rear extension addressed the issues through the removal of the corner of the existing building at ground level, which when combined with the new footprint of the extension provides an open-planed Kitchen/Dining Room of generous proportions. To introduce the much-needed natural light to the space the south elevation is clad entirely with full height Crittall glazing.

The deep overhanging brick clad soffit helps to keep the internal environment of the room cool by cutting out the direct path of the sun at the hottest times of the day. A large 3.2m spanning rooflight helps to draw natural light further towards the heart of the building, and helps cool the internal environment with an automated opening panel and solar control glass. Brick clad interiors to match the external brick cladding and polished concrete floors are used to complete the contemporary and semi-industrial look.