Isle of Wight, United Kingdom
Author: Chris Fuggis
House of salt marshes. Photo © Nick Kane
Mar 2023, <>
Architects & Companies
Neil McLaughlin
Ever since the British visited the seaside, the country's coastal architecture has been freely borrowed from distant places. The Victorian resort is full of onion domes and pagodas, guaranteeing a new feel and laid-back relaxation. This tradition is pleasantly echoed in Níall McLaughlin Architects' Saltmarsh House, an elegant pavilion that offers entertainment space and guest accommodation on its client's waterfront home on the Isle of Wight, four miles from mainland England.
The main house is a jagged 19th-century pile perched on a low hill, with gardens extending to the tidal marshlands adjacent to the natural harbor. A winding path leads to a gazebo by the water. It is a sensitive environment and the main purpose is to proceed with caution. "We started with the idea of a delicate frame floating on the ground," McLaughlin said. "A simple sketch may already show a platform shaded by a canopy roof, and varying rays of light coming in from the ocean and sky.
A variety of influences drove the design, from memories of the fragile greenhouse that once stood on the site to a widespread fascination with Asia when the main house was built. London-based McLaughlin also has Australian homes in particular in mind, whose openness allows for an intimate connection with the environment and a certain freedom within it.
Regulations on thermal performance now make this minimal structure challenging, but the achieved building has an almost ethereal lightness, which becomes more evident on approach. Low stilts lift the wooden deck, just away from the grass. Above, a dark copper roof folded into intersecting pyramids stands high on a nearly non-existent attenuated column. The volume of the three copper cladding—enclosing the kitchen, bedroom and bathroom—appears to hover under the deep eaves, with no visible means of support.
When arriving at the short pedestrian bridge leading to the deck, the spectacular effect of the building's lightweight frame, performed entirely by 1/16-inch steel tubes, is revealed. Two rows of columns, spaced 5 feet 5 inches (<> meters), produce four square-structured bays embedded half the distance from the edges of the deck and roof. Three of the bays are glass to enclose a long glass-walled restaurant overlooking the water, and one of them is open, forming a covered terrace at its entrance.
The restaurant (above) overlooks the adjacent salt marsh and port (top of page). Photo © Nick Kane, click to enlarge.
Each skeleton column consists of four tubes in loose clusters so that glass walls can pass through them, keeping the frame readable from the inside out. Finding a way was crucial to find a way to do so, McLaughlin said, but the architect hid until he discovered the square stone pillars while visiting a 10th-century amber fort in Jaipur, India.
Overhead, a cat's gold-painted steel cradle supports the folding planes of the roof, which are represented by ash slats and framed triangular skylights. Inside the restaurant, warm wooden planks line the walls under three large windows on the sea-facing side, dotted with vertical strips of glass showing how the columns meet the floor. The same careful articulation of elements reappears on the opposite wall, where deep doors to smaller rooms are connected to bookcases in three separate blocks. Wherever you look, you can see more evidence of strict logic – for example, cylindrical luminaires have the same diameter and finish as steel structures.
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Six triangular skylights (1) bring light into the restaurant, while deep eaves (2 and 3) express the horizontality of the pavilion. © Photo Nick Kane
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The harmonious coherence between the parts makes the intricate, detailed room feel very serene. Reading the pavilion is enjoyable, but it can also recede from view and give way to a more impressive experience, with light moving over the walls and the tides slowly undulating. Both reason and feeling are involved. "The human spirit is very pleased with the interaction between the two," McLaughlin said. "Everything is in the logical, geometric and structural order, which is the foundation, but at some point, you can forget about architectural decisions, architecture makes you feel the location in different ways.
Its openness, shade and shelter combine to connect with the environment in any weather. In the coup d'état in the pavilion described by McLaughlin, three large electric windows on the seaside descend like guillotines and descend through the low wall at the bottom to below the floor. The interior is open to the air and filled with the smells and sounds of swamps, while protecting the elements through a wrap-around balcony, which the architect likens to the Japanese Round River.
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The folding plane of the roof (4 and 5) is framed by a delicate steel tube frame. © Photo Nick Kane
In another joyous moment, wooden screens pop out of each windowsill to prevent the room from feeling like a fish tank at night. Their inner surfaces are lined with hand-painted silk and patterned with delicate wetland reeds.
Achieving such precise precision relies on close collaboration with Millimetre, a professional contractor known for artists and architects working with innovative and complex structures. It was the most challenging project the company undertook, director Karn Sandilands said. "We always work with a tolerance of 3 mm, which requires great endurance and foresight." The steel elements and interior woodwork are handmade outside the site, as are the wooden "pods" in the three small rooms.
The organization of these vestibules is ingenious, albeit quirky. Single pocket doors leading to the kitchen and bathroom align with sliding windows, providing views from the hall on the axis to the garden, while the utensils of daily life remain invisible on both sides. In the bedroom, however, the strict geometry of the building meant that the bed filled the length of the room, and separate doors were required to access both sides of the room. With beautiful built-in furniture and brass fixtures, it could be a compact cabin on an ocean liner or a railroad sleeper carriage from a bygone era. Living full-time can be frustrating, but taking a short break from routine can be exciting. It is part of the entire complex – a building that perfectly corresponds to its intended use and location, with alluring hints of a distant architectural world.
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Credits
Architect:
Níall McLaughlin Architects — Níall McLaughlin, Director; Tilo Genther, Project Assistant; Alastair Browning, Project Architect; Andreas Mullertz, architect
Engineer:
Smith and Wall Works (Structural/Civil Engineering); Ritchie + Dalfen (m/f/f)
Consultant:
Kim Wilkie (landscape); Montague Evans (Planning/Heritage)
General Contractor:
millimetre
Area:
1,140 sq ft
Completion Date:
<> January 2021