Blenheim Grove Townhouse
Peckham, London
2023
The fit out of a split level townhouse in London’s first custom build development.
Unlike anything we’ve worked on before, we were invited to design the fit out of an apartment and townhouse in London’s first custom built row of terrace houses. Winner of RIBA London award in 2025, together with Poulsom Middlehurst architects (who designed the building’s external shell) and YARD architects (designer’s of a wonderful townhouse next door to this one).
A calm palette with splashes of colour
Much of the finishing was completed by our clients themselves, with the fit out design creating the canvas for them to work with - a neutral colour palette with pops of colour to the bathrooms.
Working with the building shell
Although a fixed shell, the building had been conceived to allow the occupiers multiple ways of living and using it - giving them complete flexibility to decide the type of home they wanted to create.
Much of our early work involved testing different arrangements and possibilities based on the shell building: the number and sizes of bedrooms, the location of the kitchen (whether on the lower ground floor or ground floor level), the entrance sequence and entrance level WC.
Flexibility and choice
The custom build housing model offers clients the best of both worlds: a high quality new build home built to modern standards with the flexibility to put one’s own stamp on it.
And, for our clients, there was an economic incentive too - the shell model is a more affordable alternative than the other period houses on the street, even when the total project costs are included for.
Somewhere between a new build and a refurbishment.
We were responsible for everything inside the structural and watertight ‘shell’. This meant we needed to design the basement insulation to floors and walls, fully plan the internal layouts, bathrooms and kitchen and account for the heating and electrical systems. Together with the arrangement and design of all of the internal walls, floors and ceiling build ups - acoustics and fire safe design. In this case including a fire curtain to separate the bedroom floor levels from the living areas.
Home wide heat recovery
The shell building had been designed to high levels of air tightness and thermal performance - with a mechanical ventilation and heat recovery (MVHR) unit in mind. This boiler size box takes hot air from the bathrooms and kitchens and recovers the heat, delivering warm clean air into the living areas and bedrooms. We worked with th eMVHR designer to allow for the many, many ducts and vents that needed to be distributed throughout the home, concealing them in walls and floors.