Rise Design Studio has recently extended a semi-detached house in London, cladding the interiors in Douglas fir and creating a reading nooks in windows. Named Douglas House on account of its extensive use of the wood, the property is a three-storey residence, with the family rooms taking over the ground floor that extends into the garden. A ground floor that also houses a feature utility room that has been designed with the utmost care, and a series of built-in larders that extend from the timber floor and hide within the walls of the living room.
The first floor is made up by the children’s rooms, decorated with wooden details and other natural materials, and a stunning family bathroom that lets you bathe under the natural light that seeps in from the rooflight above.
Finally, a loft conversion houses the Master Bedroom- a dream-like space that folds onto its corners with beautiful storage solutions and a second half-floor that extends upwards like a tower where you can read or gaze outwards from the heights of the roof.
A house with thresholds into unique personal spaces, the atmosphere inside the house is as designed as its surfaces, with great attention to the lighting- both natural and electrical- and the ventilation. The project has been built to air-tightness, and is equipped with an MVHR unit that implements the most efficient forms of ventilation and temperature control available in the market, providing fresh filtered air into the building whilst retaining most of the energy that has already been used in heating it up.
The warm, neutral palette of the project becomes alive through its many textures. Each space becomes a place of its own, making the most out of the beauty of the day-to-day of every single one of the programs of a house: from the living room to the bedrooms, and from the circulation spaces to the utility room.
