This imaginative building punches well above its weight
Blee Halligan for Five Acre Barn
Contract value: Confidential
GIA: 450m²
Five Acre Barn provides bed and breakfast accommodation for five visitors who can live and dine together, or use their rooms as a base. It has a stepping, organic form that wriggles among the trees in a mature garden. Each room is expressed in the roof form and has its own timber deck. The new building is directly linked to a retained workshop that has been repaired in such a minimalist way that once inside, you are surprised by the single-volume stylish kitchen/living space.
Everywhere the finishes are simple, but the mid-century furniture, artwork and light fittings bring a Shoreditch-style to Suffolk. What is most surprising, and pleasing given the standard of workmanship, is that the project has largely been a self-build. The owners not only installed the cedar shingle cladding themselves, but completed most of the joinery and decoration. The scale and budget might be modest, but this imaginative building punches well above its weight.
Small Project of the Year
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