Pine Trees is a new country house nestled on a site at the top of Tickenham wood, overlooking the Severn Estuary. The site is surrounded by dense woodland, with a commanding yet secluded setting off an access road.
The original house on the site was a dilapidated early 20th century structure in the location of the newly built structure. Jonathan Lees Architects were commissioned to design a new, sustainable dwelling in the Queen Anne revival language of architecture, with the practice developing its unique style of Arts and Crafts fused with the Classical undertones of the more formal tradition.
The ethos and integrity of the project was based on the use of high quality, local materials from the outset, including the use of local trades that could achieve the fine details that the design demanded to ensure its authenticity.
The design is based on a simple symmetrical plan that includes a utility wing and garage wing, developed in a subservient architectural language to the main mass of the house, with a more formal timber orangery on the opposite wing to balance the enveloping wing on the east forming the courtyard.
The combination of ruby red and cherry brick with a subtle, complimentary buff limestone presented the architect with a simple choice of materials to use. The feature cornicione that envelopes the main structure is painted timber, providing a balance to the beautifully constructed timber sash windows and doors. The brickwork was immaculately laid to coursing diagrams, with flat voussoir arches to the sash windows and 45mm brick quoin slips being used to frame each window to the main house. These slips coursed in with the main HG Matthews wood fired bricks, that in turn coursed into the rusticated stone quoins that form the corners of the structure.
Precision to our coursing diagrams and detail drawings was essential and these were followed to exacting standards, creating a structure that was impeccably close to our vision and details and ensuring that the principal features worked and were able to be set out in a scholarly manner.
Pine Trees is an example of how an age-old tradition of highly skilled trades working together can still deliver to exacting standards, from the selection of the materials to the precise fitting on site, allowing the details to sing together in unison on the facades without compromise. The result is a composition of materials that delivers precisely what our vision, as architects, set out to achieve.
