Whithurst Park Cottage
Subscribe now to instantly view this image
Subscribe to the Architects’ Journal (AJ) for instant access to the AJ Buildings Library, an online database of nearly 2,000 exemplar buildings in photographs, plans, elevations and details.
Already a subscriber? Sign in
View of lodge and garage across paddock
David Churchill (website) Download Original
A timber clad gatehouse consisting of open plan living and kitchen area, bedrooms, bathrooms and double garage
The new gatehouse and double garage are built at the entrance to a 100 acre park and woodland estate in West Sussex. Clad in local untreated oak boarding the building echoes the qualities of traditional agricultural buildings.
The main house is characterised by a deep, long, vertical rooflight that splits the triangle in two and runs along the length of the building. Its purpose is to illuminate the central, triple-height volume of stair, landing and gallery. Light from this cleft diffuses through translucent screens into the two guest bedrooms which lie off the central space. A mini-staircase from the rear and most easterly of these bedrooms, with tiny alternate treads, leads to extra attic space above.
The building uses exposed fair-faced concrete for the primary structure with oak windows set into the frame at ground floor level and timber cladding covering the first floor. The sharply pitched roof is clad in zinc finishing the narrow tonal range of materials.
Data
- Begun: Jul 2000
- Completed: Jun 2001
- Floor area: 363m2
- Sector: House
- Total cost: £485,905
- Tender date: Apr 2000
- Procurement: JCT 98 Intermediate
- Address: Plaistow Road , Kirdford , Billingshurst , RH14 0JX, United Kingdom
Professional Team 
- Architect: James Gorst Architects
- Project architect: Sandy Rendel
- Client: Richard Taylor and Rick Englert
- Quantity surveyor: Holpen Associates
- Main contractor: Ceecom
- Structural engineer: Conisbee
Suppliers
- Zinc roof: Boss Metals
- Precast concrete: Cranstone Concrete
- Steelwork and specialist metalwork: Goddard Engineering
- Vitral rooflight: Elliots HPR
- Oak windows: Fairoak Timber
