Granville Road
This wonderful 19th century, former dairy building, in the southern suburbs of Liverpool, had been cut off from its former farm surroundings with the introduction of the railways to the city in the mid 1800’s and then hidden behind housing developments as the city expanded south. Forgotten by the most of the local community, the building has had a colourful past being used as a junk yard, coffin makers & furniture workshop amongst others things.
Our brief was to develop proposals for the conversion of the site for housing, whilst keeping as much of the character of the existing building as possbile.
Our approach was to carefully peel back the layers of history in the building and then work with the original architecture to design a pair of contemporary mews houses that celebrate the charm and character of the original building whilst catering for the demands of modern living.
With the site landlocked on two sides and having limited window openings, getting natural light into the living spaces was a challenge. However a new architectural intervention in the form of a single storey extension along the length of the building allows us to flood the deep floor plans with light from new roof lights and large new window openings, whilst providing a distinct, visual separation between the contemporary interventions on the ground floor and the protection and repair of the original architecture above. The celebration of the original architecture continues throughout the project with the layout of the upper floors designed to keep the original, King Post roof trusses exposed and the installation of vaulted ceilings adding a sense of drama to the bedrooms.