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Grand Designs House of the Year S08E01
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00:00Hello. Gosh, how I've missed you. But now the Royal Institute of British Architects' House of
00:10the Year Award is back. And we have more beautiful homes to show you than ever before. We are also
00:17fully upgraded. So the drone, for example, is now quieter and more respectful of context.
00:25No way. Oh, and the houses. Well, they are, of course, truly exceptional. They are completely
00:33out of this world. Where are you, you little bastard?
00:42The show that celebrates the UK's favourite pastime, snooping around other people's homes,
00:47is back. What is that? And the fixtures have never been more artisanal. It's like one of
00:54those kind of things at the dentist where you have, you know, they do an x-ray. They
00:57will leave the room. The judges have handpicked a long list of Britain's most awe-inspiring new
01:03buildings. Don't just come off this very British street into something that is from the other
01:06side of the planet. These are all houses that will take your breath away. I mean, what the
01:12heck? The judges will have the hard task of whittling them down to a short list of just
01:17seven. It's just so complicated. There are so many things at play. And in the final programme,
01:24we'll find out which of these will be crowned House of the Year 2025.
01:30The stakes are high. The ceilings are even higher. Welcome to House of the Year 2025.
01:36I've taken all the long-listed houses we're looking at and divided them into four categories. In
01:43later episodes, we'll discover homes that make you feel like you're on holiday, houses that are
02:11remarkable transformations and homes that demonstrate exceptional craftsmanship.
02:17exploring these with me is the architect Damien Burrows. Oh, this is breathtaking. And the
02:25conservation architect, Natasha Huck. Oh, look at this place. It's just so welcoming.
02:32This time, we'll be looking at houses that are built against all the odds. And if grand
02:38science has taught me anything over the past 25 years, it's that the odds are hugely stacked against
02:42the self-builder. In fact, I don't understand why anybody tries to build anything ever anywhere. But
02:49for those plucky, fearless, sometimes hapless individuals who do embark on the architectural
02:55journey, the results can be life-changing. Our first long-listed home, built against the odds,
03:06sits in the remote Outer Hebrides on Harris, a rugged island off the west coast of Scotland.
03:15This is Kirkland Creek, a jewel-like home built beside the water and through nine savage storms.
03:25The house is compact and efficient, centred on a bright open plan kitchen and living space.
03:37Off this is a quiet bedroom, a single bathroom, a utility room, all neatly arranged with no need
03:44for corridors. It was the work of a brave couple.
03:48It's Archisex Ailey and her partner, Jack, who built it by hand.
03:55First date, we were just trying to suss each other out and Jack had asked some background questions.
04:01And at the time, I had just been given the keys to a flat, my first flat that I'd bought,
04:05and I needed a kitchen made. And so I had asked Jack to make a kitchen.
04:09I was interested in architecture, but I don't think I'd ever met an architect. It's quite mysterious,
04:13actually. Ailey had been to Japan and to Norway and, you know, done all these amazing things.
04:19They moved to the island after falling in love with it when visiting. While they planned the project,
04:24they rented and got their first taste of the challenges of building here.
04:29I think we're off home.
04:34We went through one of the first name's dorms there. This was a traditional stone house and the
04:37house was shaking. The roof blew off. The polytunnel at the back flew away. We were actually nervous our
04:44car was going to roll. I think it was gusting over 100 miles an hour. It was quite a welcome to the island.
04:54Ailey had a strong vision of how to make something that would belong in this place.
04:59We knew that we wanted to be working with the stone, with the materials from the landscape.
05:03Easier said than done, of course, but their friend Dan, a stonemason, took on that hard task with relish.
05:10We were working with something called the Louisiana Nice, and that is incredibly dense and incredibly heavy.
05:19So the first few days trying to get my body conditioned to be able to just
05:24lump that stuff around was really, really difficult. It was really, really tough going.
05:28It was so hard to cut that Dan decided to go to the quarry to find the size of stone he needed,
05:36meaning less to chisel away at. All this lumping stone around had a strong effect on him.
05:44I started the job slightly rotund. We'd just had our wee boy, so I'd have what you call a bit of a dad bod.
05:51But by the time I'd finished, I had lost a fair bit of weight. I was a different man
05:56coming out than I was going in. I would recommend it. If you're looking to lose weight, come and spend
06:00three months on the island building Louisiana Nice, and that will sort you right out for sure.
06:07This ancient rock, Louisiana Nice, is what the whole island is made from.
06:13And there was also a great big lump of it right in the middle of where Ailey and Jack were building.
06:18Ailey made a big design decision. We decided to actually work with it. Using the area that we had
06:26around this rock created this 135 degree angle. Inside, this unusual shape makes the small house
06:35feel bigger. It opens it up with angled views through to other rooms.
06:39The RIBA judges admired this compact yet generous home where each space has a different character.
06:51You can see through from the living space into the kitchen space whilst they are still separate.
06:56So that's really successful. Each one of the rooms spans directly off of a centralised living room and
07:03it's making the most of the space within a very, very small house. So there's no circulation.
07:10They managed to build this extraordinarily beautiful place for just 167,000 pounds by designing and building
07:19it themselves. Living on site as they were building. It was a really intense period and we were working
07:26flat out six days a week, 12 hours a day just to get it finished.
07:33He had a big beard, my hair was long, I was sharing my caravan with my dog. We didn't have a shower on
07:38site. So we had to drive in and have a shower every couple of days. So it was extreme living,
07:42I would say. Went slightly feral towards the end of things, opening the door of your caravan and
07:47pissing out into the wind in the night. Not only that, they were also under attack from the local
07:52wildlife. The midges got so bad on one occasion. I do remember we were under siege in the caravan for
07:59most of the afternoon and you've never seen anything like this. It was just outrageous. I mean,
08:04there was a dense cloud of midges just hanging outside the window, climbing through the window.
08:11It was just too difficult and you'd never think that you'd have to take an afternoon off
08:15just for little insects. It was just crazy.
08:18But for Jack, Dan, Ailey and her brother who helped, every bite, every sore muscle,
08:26every night going to bed soaked to the bone was worth it.
08:32What I'm most proud of is the fact that we've done it.
08:37We kind of set out to do this without knowing what we wanted to achieve. We wanted to do a really nice
08:41design. We wanted to have a place that we could live ourselves that reflected our values,
08:45our ethos, how we practice. We ask clients to take the risk every day in our work. And so if we
08:52can't do it, then it's tricky to ask other people. So I'm so proud that we've taken the leap to live
08:58somewhere that we want, to build something that we want. And we're now living here and it couldn't
09:03be better for me.
09:04We've seen one house so far that's defied the odds. We've got five more still to see before we find
09:15out which has been nominated for the House of the Year prize 2025.
09:18Gravity is a bit like aging. It's inevitable and it only goes one way. So if you try to ignore it,
09:36that's pointless. When you build and attempt to defy it with cantilevers or by building on a slope,
09:43for example, you need to come armed with more than optimism. You need engineering, intelligence.
09:52You need accuracy, precision. Oh, that was stupid.
10:01I'm visiting our next long-listed home in Hastings, a town spread out on a steep hill.
10:07In places the gradient is so steep it rivals a ski run. Here, building anything isn't just construction.
10:16It's a battle with gravity. It's a form of engineering gymnastics. One wrong move and whatever
10:22you're building could end up in next door's garden. But Simon embraced the challenges of building here.
10:31His previous job was making split second decisions in the volatile world of oil trading.
10:36His career was built on risk and timing.
10:40I thought, right, it's a good time to change up what I was doing and be in a different place.
10:44And my grandparents lived here when I was young. So I spent a lot of school and summer holidays
10:50coming down to the coast and it felt quite natural to like, to come here again when I was wanting to
10:56maybe think about relocating outside of London.
10:59This is where the house is going to be.
11:01The house was built in London.
11:01He bought this twin-gabled Victorian house, refurbished it and extended it onto the slope in the back garden.
11:10And so Hastings House was born.
11:14Inside, there was a semi open-plan space, long and light-filled, like a gallery,
11:19with kitchen and dining room off it a few steps above is a cozy private living space called the
11:27garden room and then there's a lower courtyard an outdoor space next to the garden room further up
11:34the slope accessed by an external staircase is simon's office and at the top is a pergola
11:39which crowns the top terrace standing as a sort of outdoor room
11:43you walk into a refurbished living room
11:57basically the whole house was stripped back to brickwork and started again but it's at the back
12:03where the real magic happens the whole structure has been completely remade this is amazing it's so
12:10unexpected it's just so much light what was the old dining room has been modernized and now connects
12:20to a glass corridor with the kitchen area yeah you don't expect from the front of the house an old
12:26victorian house and then you get the kind of contrast to the back because it's such a steep hill it's
12:32trying to make sure that when you feel don't feel that you're enclosed and trapped in the back of the
12:35house the house didn't flow at all you kept going to a load of dead ends so we're trying to work out
12:41ways you can move around the house a little bit more easily they haven't just added rooms they've
12:47reimagined how the whole house works each new space like this garden room follows the natural slope of
12:54the hill stepping up in carefully judged levels one leading seamlessly to the next this is your first step
13:01up the hill that takes you up and works with like this deep slope so we've got it's just really
13:05interesting because it leads you on this journey it's sort of quite a steep slope and so rather than
13:11everything sitting at the bottom and then you're like looking up at it it's trying to get this feeling
13:14of moving through the space gradual movement yeah exactly but also just taking advantage and using
13:20using it as a benefit that we've got the steep site that has loads of different layers so it gives you
13:24some really interesting views and angles and as you look back across the house you see different
13:28elements and aspects the RIBA judges praised the beautiful refurbishment of the old house
13:37and the incredible spaces simon and his architect created all the more amazing when it used to look like
13:45this the house was like a 70s fever dream it was like someone had moved in 50 years ago done a really
13:54beautiful amazing top to bottom renovation and nothing since and aside from doing nothing since
14:01there'd just been bits added so everything was built on top of no nothing had ever been like stripped
14:05back and done again it was just layer upon layer upon layer and it's the same in the back garden
14:09there's like layer upon sheet of concrete and then rubble and then more concrete on top of it
14:15there's a huge vine that grew over everything in some ways it would have been simpler to demolish
14:23what was here and start from scratch but simon's architect Hugh strange didn't want to do that
14:29knocking it all down and rebuilding it was a really um problematic approach problematic in terms of the
14:36money involved that it was like more expensive but also in terms of the carbon and the kind of
14:41environmental considerations and there is a lot of courage in that because it's not obviously
14:46beautiful these kind of leftover pieces and they were viewed as an eyesore before i think we all
14:52quite early on were committed to this idea of repairing it i sometimes call it darning the idea
14:57you know rather than throwing a pair of socks out because it's got a hole in it we actually just
15:01carefully kind of stitched the site together and through that we kind of repaired the site
15:06in a way that could accept the new buildings you know it was just a too poor condition beforehand to
15:11you know to take the support of a of a building
15:17what he's created is a set of beautiful pavilions that step up the hill containing simon's office and
15:23a space at the top to just enjoy the view the actual task of doing it was challenging beyond belief
15:31and fell to structural engineer charlotte garvin you can see that there is three terraces which all have
15:37retaining walls which in some places are no longer vertical so they're leaning and bowing and they're
15:44moving around a little bit they sort of equate to about two stories of retained height which for any
15:50engineer is quite a big challenge so obviously the retaining walls needed a lot of care to make them
15:55stable enough to build upon they did need to be repaired and then we added these ground anchors
16:02which basically try and restrain the wall you normally see them on the sides of roads and in big
16:07embankments um you wouldn't often find them in a domestic setting but the benefit of them is that
16:13you didn't need a huge machinery to come in and install them because we have this quite constrained site
16:18this isn't just an extension it's civil engineering domestic scale with all the risk and precision
16:29that implies this house was laced into a hillside one platform at a time and the cleverest part is that
16:36it hides the struggle to do that completely you've got to be brave when you set out to build any house
16:43but this this is a leap of faith simon entrusted hue with an almost impossible architectural challenge
16:50and what simon and hue have created is not an extension but a series of light-filled connections
16:54that unlock the whole site celebrating its difficult landscape and turning an unloved and
16:59dilapidated space into something truly unique
17:21the relationship between a homeowner and their architect should be like any strong partnership
17:27built on trust clear communication and the occasional awkward silence when the budget gets mentioned
17:33but what if it wasn't a partnership in what if instead it became more of a group activity with
17:39more voices more opinions twice the emails three times the mood boards and decision making by committee
17:47which is how they came up with the camel anyway it sounds like a recipe for design by stalemate
17:53but our next house they did precisely that and yet what emerged wasn't chaos in fact it was quite the opposite
18:03and it can be found in cornwall above the beautiful beaches built into a cliff
18:11what started as a simple brief for a family retreat quickly evolved into something far more ambitious and
18:18infinitely more complicated the client was a family that i'd worked with before they'd asked me to find a
18:27place that would be a retreat for their family somewhere by the sea and of course uh i'm cornish so i said best
18:35place cornwall we looked at the site it was fantastic and we then found slightly strangely that we could
18:44push our building a little bit further back into the hillside and make it much bigger but because it came
18:51so big it became really an expensive project so my client took the decision which i loved that rather
18:59than compromise on the design of the house they would compromise on its ownership so they decided to
19:06join forces with another family their best friends or friends
19:10and suddenly it became a house we designed for four people
19:17this is two family house a second home for two families to live in either separately or jointly
19:26downstairs shared spaces bring everyone together a pool playroom kitchen and dining area tv snug
19:34spacious living room and a carport upstairs the layout which has six bedrooms separates into two
19:42wings each with an adult ensuite plus a small shared kitchen providing privacy and independence within
19:48a single unified home it's something of a design feat to realize a house on this scale that's so
19:54beautifully resolved it's a feat of human endurance to do it for four people with different ideas of what they
20:00wanted every decision was something of a debate um everyone had their own priorities
20:08one house two husbands two wives four disparate points of view
20:16five actually don't forget mike's he had a particular vision for the walls
20:22one of the things that's incredibly important to me is the way the overall wall looks so this wall was
20:30what i wanted nice square edges everything beautiful and one day my client came down to look at the wall
20:38very proudly there's the wall and um there was a sort of silence and richard said
20:46uh no no no no no no that's much too square they're too sharp i mean there's nothing organic in it so for
20:54the remaining walls the stonemasons changed their approach so this is a much more organic version so
21:00the edges of the stones are much rougher in my wall they'd have been cut straight but here they left the edges rounded
21:09these small details pale into insignificance though against the challenges of building the place
21:17the structure took roughly five weeks to assemble comprising over 400 huge timber panels which were tricky to lift in
21:28you've got an awful lot of uplift from the wind and so on you're right on the cliff so the structure
21:33itself had to be very robust that's why the timber panels they used were the strongest possible built
21:40from clt or cross laminated timber they're slabs of wood made by gluing together timber planks in layers
21:48at 90 degrees to each other there are a lot of work to make and they are heavy to lift some of them are
21:54still two ton and they're big panels so you are almost flying a kite out there if you're not careful
22:03this place can be measured in every drop of blood sweat and tears invested in it
22:11what makes it remarkable isn't just the design but also the people who built it its designer the
22:17builder many of the crafts people are from here they know this landscape intimately and they're part
22:24of a long proud tradition of cornish craftsmanship
22:27i build all over england all over london all over the world but as my builder grandfather would
22:36always say there's no one can build houses like the cornish
22:43we've seen three houses so far built against the odds after the break we reveal more of the
22:49extraordinary homes vying for the title riba house of the year 2025
23:01our next long lister is one i know very well from grand designs and it really was epic and i mean that
23:09not just in terms of scale or ambition but because of its spirit the couple building it wanted to make
23:16something not just of extraordinary architectural value but as importantly something that could also
23:22adapt to a devastating medical diagnosis and against all the odds they created something extraordinary
23:30something calm considered deeply personal and quietly heroic the clients were john and helen they were
23:41living in a 17th century farmhouse in bedfordshire until in 2018 helen experienced a life-changing event
23:49come on peggy come on now we went down to feed the horses as helen was undoing the gate she suddenly
23:58felt faint it was extremely serious stroke she was in a coma for three weeks and when she started to come out
24:06was really very severely disabled she needed full-time care after the stroke their old house had steep stairs
24:17and narrow doorways they had to live in separate buildings it's forced us to live for separate lives that
24:27i remain living in the house now whilst helen lives in your barn and you know whilst it's very comfy
24:33uh in the barn it's not something we want to do for life is it love no
24:42this was the home they made to live in together clayworth the riba judges praised how it delivered
24:50accessible living in a very stylish building this glorious t-shaped home is a masterclass in rational
24:58designed sinking to one end sits a spacious open plan kitchen dining and living area at the opposite
25:07end of the house is a sleeping wing containing two bedrooms in the bar of the t-shape this car parking
25:14space into small guest department on the top floor there's a study hello hello hello hi john hi kevin
25:30how are you how are you i'm well how are you both we're pretty good aren't we so how is your health
25:36home very good oh great yeah it is so sharp and crisp this building it looks good when you first glimpse
25:45it teases you and as you approach it delivers more and then the details surprise you how fine and crisp
25:53they are so it carries on delivering yes but that only works if it's one step better when you get indoors
25:59is it as good as the outside better can we can we have a look of course please come in step inside
26:07and you're immediately invited to enjoy the elegant calm of the hallway and to stroke the board marked
26:14concrete walls this is amazing then you're through to the main living space the center of shared daily
26:22life for the pair of them well this is just about as perfect as it could be isn't it really
26:26i mean we are just delighted with the way this room has turned out a space where john and helen can
26:33be together again open light-filled and connected to the natural world all i see is natural landscape
26:43trees forest the sun glinting through the the leaves it reminds me just how fantastic a sight this is i
26:50think one of the things that really pleases me is the width of this room helen she has
26:57loads of space uh to move around and a helen won't top yes got this uh lower area uh specifically so
27:05that helen can approach it in the wheelchair what it provides is something that you particularly need
27:13this building to be transformational for our lives
27:18but getting to this point was frankly excruciating because the design was very ambitious a floating
27:27pavilion with a heavy weight above but seemingly weightless below to pull it off they had to crane in
27:34huge concrete roof beams it is a really tall ass to get in by october but we shall see the roof was made up of
27:4419 of these beams each weighing 1.7 tons bolted to the steel frame but it all proved too heavy the frame
27:53couldn't cope fortunately the person running things was an experienced project manager
27:59ollie john's son the welding has snapped the chippies were up there they were finishing off the roof
28:05and all of a sudden there's just a loud bang and uh the welds are basically just sheared and which
28:11caused the whole roof to suddenly sag obviously i mean the first thought was this is this is bad
28:17working with the steel contractor to resolve things it took 10 weeks and some carefully placed steel
28:24work to hold the structure up and what rose from that mangled mess was a house that's not just
28:34stronger but unapologetically stranger the bathroom is a celebration of joy color and creative anarchy
28:43that's your taste is it john well yes it is yes bonkers and welcome to the bedroom gorgeous the interior
28:56decor is quite quirky i wanted to have a bit of fun and a bit of character and i didn't want the rooms
29:04to feel sterile you're you're you're part of an avant-garde you're part of a new movement a new drive
29:11towards comfort and joy and playfulness next door is just as joyful there's a guest bedroom and
29:18bathroom and upstairs john's tranquil office the architect responsible for this extraordinary building
29:29was james arkel now why do you think the building has been nominated why do you think it's been cited i
29:36think it responds to the place and the site and i think hopefully it makes the occupants lives
29:44immeasurably better in terms of living there and i think they're good aims to have in architecture i
29:51don't kind of want it to be known as a house purely for accessibility it's always struck me that
29:57good disability design generally speaking is good design i don't know if architecture can properly
30:05heal but i have seen what it can do ease a day improve a mood lift the soul and remove barriers
30:12and in a house like this for the people who live here that is everything
30:16you have to think of the new british cheese board if you like representative now of context and of
30:29planning now this of course you know you'll find this in many people's fridges still it's not your
30:34typical resident and frankly dropped onto the cheese board it looks brash synthetic it's not
30:41what that organic cheddar signed up for but handled carefully adjusted thoughtfully even this thing
30:50can take its place on the board not by pretending to be like the others but by knowing how to live
30:57alongside them i'm in the south downs a place where homes usually come wrapped in stone flint
31:07and a whiff of heritage if you wanted to build a house that was unashamedly modern the last place
31:15you'd want to try and go about getting planning permission for that would be in a national park no
31:22i mean that's just got to be asking for trouble
31:29but that's exactly what happened here against all odds this extraordinary building appeared
31:37south downs farm the riba judges described the detailing and execution as near faultless
31:46the brave architect who took on this project was sandy rendle a previous house of the year nominee
31:53sandy looking at this house all i can say is utter sublime elegance it's so beautiful oh thanks
32:01that's extremely kind not sure it's everyone's taste but we're pretty proud of it
32:07south downs farm is split over two floors on the ground floor is a cloakroom laundry and utility room
32:15and a grand double height hallway open plan kitchen diner larder and a boot room on the other side is
32:22the main living room and study upstairs are four guest bedrooms two with ensuite and a guest bathroom and the
32:30main bedroom with an ensuite surprisingly this wasn't the home the clients originally intended to
32:38build our clients had consent for a much more traditional style house they'd actually knocked
32:44down the old house they'd laid the piling mat down they pegged it all out they were just about to start
32:48and they got slight cold feet i think they thought actually interestingly the previous design was too big
32:53did they come to you and say sandy we want something really modern just reinvent everything for us
32:59what they gave us a huge amount of freedom on was the appearance and the form of the building how do you
33:04even go about getting planning permission for a contemporary house like this of this size
33:11in this location it's not straightforward process the first challenge was getting an independent group of
33:19experts the south downs national park design review panel on side and evolving an idea with them
33:27i think looking at the wider landscape this particular bit of sussex people have used it for
33:32country houses and that was the sort of starting point for thinking about what this could be
33:37the reimagination of a country house yeah a parkland villa rather than a country house so a smaller scale version
33:43this is a country house for the 21st century there's a real sense of calm in here
33:55i have the light that's coming through oh god the double height there are plenty of things here to draw
34:02your eye whether it's the upper level balcony inside or this giant stove then there's a stove as well this is
34:11double-sided what does it lead to oh that's nice this is nice the connection between the two rooms
34:21through the focal point it's a really beautiful feature this wood burner actually has a back boiler
34:27as well so you can run all the heating and hot water in the house of this if if there's a disaster
34:31like a electrical failure or something the whole house can be heated and hot water from here
34:35it's deliberately oversized straddling the large open plan living room and the smaller snug beyond
34:47and linking them through warmth and flame it's a clever trick the grander the room in one space the
34:54cozier the one next to it feels you see the same contrast upstairs where a broad classically scaled
35:01hallway makes the more modest bedrooms feel even more intimate and that contrast continues outside
35:09with quiet low slung wings on one side and a bold formal row of columns on the other
35:16stood up here on this balcony with this incredible view you really get a sense of the grandeur of this scale
35:23yeah i mean it's largely generated by these massively oversized columns they've got this wonderful kind
35:30of pitted surface that you just want to try sort of get your fingers in yeah we wanted everything to be
35:37self-finished really expresses materiality these are actually made in very low lifts with a sort of low
35:44water low cement unreinforced and hand round to give you that sort of character of stone using a very local
35:51stone just from a couple of miles up the road from macquarie as it aggregates to the mix it's a house
35:58shaped by its setting and by a client willing to be brave a bold addition now perhaps but one that will
36:05mellow and in time belong as naturally to this landscape as any ancestral pile this really is a
36:14wonderful addition to the long and noble tradition of english country houses yes it may have contemporary
36:22concrete columns but just remember the next time that you're visiting that beloved national park manor
36:30house everything was once modern
36:33there is one more house to see before we discover which will make the shortlist for the riba house of the
36:45year 2025.
36:46we've seen five houses on the long list so far and our last home that was built against the odds
37:02took on the sort of challenge that usually ends in tears trying to build a home where there isn't any
37:08space for one in the tight jostling streets of north london i am looking for a portal it's a way in
37:19to a magical world of architecture and generous spaces yeah a place of calm and relaxation oh i don't know
37:29this is not it
37:44surely no actually it is because at the end of this grim concrete passageway lies this
37:51this is haringey brick bungalow a hidden jewel tucked away from the busy street beyond as calm and serene
38:06in this extraordinary home there's a courtyard area at the front and a small patio garden at the back
38:28then inside there's a glorious main living kitchen and dining space
38:34with two bedrooms and a bathroom of it
38:38it was designed by the architect satish jassel
38:43oh what a joy what a thing to find
38:48i mean unlikely isn't it just a little bit of a backlands plot what was it before
38:53it was just an empty plot a bit overgrown leftover like many plots around london yeah
38:59so we'd like to think of it as a bit of a diamond in the rough yeah something unexpected
39:05that is a very unlikely entrance it is it's only one meter wide so we had to build the whole house
39:13through this little passageway you had to get everything past that drain pipe it was like building
39:19a ship in a bottle wow so i mean what about the bigger items is there a bath we had to make sure
39:28whatever we put into the house yeah could fit through that alleyway white goods and everything
39:32exactly can we have a look inside of course oh it's nice
39:44inside there's no sense of the pain and difficulty that went into creating it
39:49there's a sort of continuity of materials which is so lovely there's no nothing jars it's just a sort
39:59of there's a flow
40:02but above us are these things i mean what the heck
40:07something of satish's own imagination is this coffered ceiling of vertical planks but made into a
40:19pyramid i have not seen anything quite like it it's like looking up into a honeycomb
40:28the building itself the footprint is actually quite small so by using the volume it makes something small
40:34feel quite grand yeah and expansive so it doesn't feel that small the roof here doesn't just lend the
40:43room height it gives it character like that of origami it's quite subtle and ingenious and i imagine
40:55you could just sit on the sofa all evening with a bottle of something and just you know look at the
41:00sea yeah yeah yeah exactly i could look at it all day i love this place not just because of the
41:10ingenuity that satish has applied on this improbably small site but also because of the feeling you get
41:17just standing here we all love looking at buildings in magazines and on the internet and on the television
41:26and that's not what buildings are about buildings are about spending time in the place and this
41:32building gives gently and slowly this building doesn't communicate itself easily in photographs
41:40because to enjoy it to drink its energy yeah you need to quietly sit and spend time in it
41:48the best thing about architecture the experience
42:00we've explored six remarkable homes so far but which will earn a place on the coveted shortlist
42:06will it be the handcrafted poetic cook of the creek the engineering success that is hastings house
42:13the diplomatically accomplished two family house the sculpturally serene clayworth the 21st century
42:21english country house at south downs farm or the miniature marvel that is haringey brick bungalow
42:31joining me is the chair of the judges david khan david how many houses have you chosen from this
42:37category to be on the shore list so in this category there are two first being koak and the click
42:47it's very very carefully put together it's a level of craftsmanship that exceeds just the material
42:56and its assembly it's so inspiring it really isn't a building that's about itself it's a building about
43:03a way of making homes about the island about craft traditions
43:11that's amazing yeah wonderful oh well if if we can i don't know again if our story can inspire others
43:17then that would be the nicest thing that maybe comes of it but that is that is an incredible piece
43:22of news thank you there's one more house in this category so what's the second house you shortlisted
43:28the second house is hastings house what strikes me as interesting that's such an unusual approach he
43:39thought i want to somehow evolve this sequence of little pavilions out of the building and stitch it
43:46back in i would say it is the treatment of the landscape that is the really exciting bit of the
43:52project that drives everything else and it looks like it was a lot of work a lot of costs technically
43:59very challenging from the interior it feels like you move from something familiar and victorian into
44:08something quite other heading up to the road above it definitely feels unexpected and a complete surprise and
44:17you have the feeling like it'd just be such a great place to have guests that they would come and
44:23just realize you knew that this existed
44:30that's great congratulations isn't that terrific that's how exciting yeah there's you know hours and
44:37hours and years and years of care and um and kind of resourcefulness there in the project so it's really
44:42great that that's rewarded kirk and the craig and hastings house are first on the shortlist there are
44:51five more places up for grabs before we find out which of them will be crowned the 2025 riba house of the
44:58year the homes we've been looking at are of course all prototypes but prototypes for a more intelligent
45:08more grounded more grounded more sustainable way of building and they show us that architecture isn't
45:13just about designing buildings it's about designing better ways to live and if that is the direction
45:20of travel we're heading in then let's pick up the pace i'm in
45:28next time we'll explore houses that whisk you on holiday this just makes you happy doesn't it
45:35the client really loved this idea of it feeling like a really sunny optimistic interior six more
45:41homes to inspire relaxation my ambition was to create a place that made you feel really really at
45:46ease really really connected to nature and escapism i was on holiday in thailand and i just thought how
45:53can i transport this magical feeling to east london
45:57and that next batch is here at next wednesday from eight now more four is back on the foot plate in
46:06just a minute incredible achievements of engineering in god's own country with steam train diaries and
46:12from steaming to streaming dark secrets in the scottish wilderness with our new drama summer water
46:18you can catch every episode right now 24 hours in a and e is here next
46:31you
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