Houzz Tour: Fresh Ideas in a Former Tomato Packing Shed
“We wanted to create a very flexible, adaptable space,” says architect Jamie Falla of the M House on Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands off the northwest coast of France. The former tomato packing shed is now a three-bedroom home designed to celebrate the building’s soaring roof, original wood and sunny location. “When we first saw the shed in 2010, it was just a big open-plan space with metal cladding on the exterior,” Falla says. “The plan was to keep the existing structure — the envelope — and preserve as much of that open space” as possible.
Inside the structure Falla and his team designed a box that sits within the open-plan space and contains the kitchen, storage, shower room and utility area. Across from the box, a glass-fronted platform hovers above the living room. Falla also added a single-story wing containing the bedrooms, two bathrooms and a study. He was designing the property to sell it, and not for a client, so he wanted to give it wide appeal. “It had to be flexible, but not having a client also gave us some freedom,” he says. “This is, essentially, an experimental building.”
Houzz at a Glance
Location: Central Guernsey, the Channel Islands
Year built: 2012
Size: 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 1 shower room
The former metal shed is now a beautiful wood building. “It’s a very lightweight timber structure,” says Falla, of Jamie Falla Architecture. He chose English sweet chestnut for the siding, which covers new insulation and the original corrugated metal, and left the wood untreated. “Exposure to the U.K. climate and UV light damages any finish or paintwork,” Falla says. “So we left the timber as it is. It’s going to go black in places, gray in others, and become more weathered.”
Inside, the kitchen is contained in a box that sits within the open-plan living space. Behind it is a utility room, a shower room and integrated storage space; above is a study-playroom. You can walk around the kitchen and access the living space from either side. “The box is clad with the wide Douglas fir boards we used on the floor,” Falla says. “The upper floor is fronted with toughened glass.”
Kitchen: Poliform; flooring: 300-millimeter-wide Douglas fir with soap and lye finish, Dinesen
The platform provides an intimate living space (an “escape space,” as Falla calls it), and the circular window is a playful touch. “[We] would never normally put a circular window in, but it was a nice way to replace two small, high windows that were there originally,” he says.
Chairs: Series 7 by Arne Jacobsen for Fritz Hansen; table: Super-Elliptical by Piet Hein for Fritz Hansen
The same Douglas fir that was used for the flooring and to wrap the internal box crops up on the staircase’s beautiful, built-in handrail as well. “It’s about touching a soft piece of timber as you rise up and down in the house,” says Falla. “The carpenters who worked on this project were real craftsmen. They were amazing, so we had fun pushing them to create something wonderful and seeing them enjoy the process.” Over time the rail will acquire a patina from all the people who have used it and lived here. “Details like this run through the house,” says Falla. “Little flowing details that bring a sense of harmony.”
Corridors run along both sides of the kitchen box. This side runs along the garden wall, where huge windows bring in lots of light. “We are interested in place,” Falla says. “So we have tried to capture the south light and also the morning light through these huge, theatrical windows.”
A single-story addition houses the bedrooms and two bathrooms. A corridor flowing off the front entrance leads down to this section of the property, and a wall of glass helps capture natural light.
The house is full of well-thought-out details that do not shout for attention, but give the building depth and character. “The way the master bedroom windows turn back toward the house, for instance,” says Falla. “They create a courtyard feel. These kinds of details are quite subtle, and you may not notice them at first, but they all add to the experience of living here.”
Chair: Swan by Arne Jacobsen for Fritz Hansen
Making the most of natural light was one driver of this project, but Falla also prioritized the electrical lighting. “We always have a lighting designer on every build,” he says. “It’s important that at night the house shines as a whole.”
The granite by the front door is all that remains of a low wall that ran around the property. “It’s a nice reminder of what was there before,” Falla says. The window on this side has been bumped out to create a window seat inside. “You can sit there with a book to enjoy the morning light,” says Falla. “It’s about being able to enjoy different moments of the day in different parts of the house.”
BEFORE AND AFTER: The original metal-clad structure with its low granite wall is seen at left, and the renovated building is at right.
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