Pounchen End FarmHemel, Hertfordshire




The proposal will replace an existing building on the site, originally been an agricultural building. In recent years this has been used as an art studio and office. The site lies within the Greanbelt and the Chilterns AONB and has such carries considerable restrictions on building footprint and volume. 

Limitation on visual harm has led to a design concept that is based on a simple sheltered low profile courtyard typology. This strategy innovatively reverses the standard local approach of dwelling set within external amenity to one of a dwelling pushed to the site boundaries with a sheltered courtyard garden. Courtyard housing topologies are used extensively around the world but less so within the UK. Such an innovative strategy can enable more efficient and less visually impactful development in edge of settlement and open countryside locations. The planning case seeks to utilise NPPF Para 139 which affords significant weight to buildings that are ‘outstanding or innovative designs which promote high levels of sustainability, or help raise the standard of design more generally in an area, so long as they fit in with the overall form and layout of their surroundings.’

The decision to develop a courtyard therefore sprung from a desire to have an inward-looking property creating a sense of privacy within the site whilst minimising the visual impacts to the surrounding hamlet. The dwelling is a low-key contemporary design featuring a flat roof green roof. As such the building from the road will appear as a standard rural boundary wall.The building is recessed 1.0m into the existing ground level to ensure the roof apex retains the feel and proportions of standard local boundary walls and fences thus ensuring a reduced visual impact.

The project will be constructed to Passivhaus standards.
 





Project Name: Pounchen End Farm
Location: Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire
Landscape Architects: Adams Habermehl
Planning Consultant: Trevor Standen

Visualisation: Darc Studio
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