HAMPSHIRE HOUSE WINS A RIBA REGIONAL AWARD
MAY 2019
We are happy to announce that our project Hampshire House has won a RIBA Regional Award.
The project is a new build house situated in a riverside setting in Hampshire. The client wanted to create a contemporary house with a connection to the surroundings. The house is arranged in a series of staggered volumes, which are conceived of as an entrance to the landscape. The spaces frame the three key views; meadows, lakes and gardens. In the centre is the top lit, double height kitchen, around which daily life revolves. The walls are flint quoined in Purbeck stone and the main frame is precast concrete. Windows and cladding are made from oak which is untreated and will weather to match the colour of the locally sourced stone and flintwork.
AN OXFORD OUTING
DECEMBER 2017
Last month NMLA’s Balliol College team went on a celebratory excursion to Oxford to mark an important project milestone. We visited selected buildings by the office and by others, called at the site to observe demolition-in-progress, and finally hid from the rain for festive beverages.
All aboard the 9 o’clock train from London Marylebone. The sky is grey and the clouds are heavy.
One hour later, two taxis crawl up the hill to Ripon College. Ten excited people are deposited on its driveway.
We enter the chapel. Two people to pull the entrance door wide. Eyes up; iPhones out; pause to pose for photo.
Outside, driver’s thumbs drum-drumming against the steering wheel. Doors open; it’s time to go. Heart FM for the drive into town.
Students mill around Somerville College. Camouflaged amongst them we enter NMLA’s housing block. Up the stair tower, peeking into bedrooms and kitchens, we debate the merits of bathroom pods.
Herzog and de Meuron’s Blavatnik School of Government stands next to Somerville, glittering. Like magpies we are drawn through its doors.
On the roof terrace Oxford is laid out beneath us, dreaming spires etc., but next: lunch.
Heavier and happier, we walk to Worcester College’s Nazrin Shah Building. Heads pressed to the glass we stare greedily inside.
Later, eleven sets of PPE are donned and rainclouds assemble as we tour the site. Mud, glorious mud. Three years till ribbon-cutting.
The rain starts, the pub beckons. Cheers to Balliol!