Grammont House, London

Amalgam architect Mark Mallindine completely remodelled the interior of this 1930s suburban house in North London.

Drawing on a classic modernist style to compliment the existing house, he used a simple palette of materials such as walnut, limestone and stainless steel, and revealed extensive garden views using floor-to-ceiling glazing.

The Bathroom won Bathroom Designer of the Year.

This stunning refurbishment of a couple’s previously unremarkable 1930s suburban house is proof it’s never too late to reinvent the place we call home.

Here, Mark Mallindine, Amalgam architect and designer, describes Grammont House in his own words:

““The house is on a private road in Stanmore. The owners are now retired; it had been the family home and now they wanted to do it up, after 20 years. I suggested the house no longer needed to be so family oriented, and ‘boxy’ — the original house was quite chintzy and cottagey too, and I wanted to give the interior a more serious and grander feel.”

— Mark Mallindine

So, without extending the property at all, we completely re-planned it.

We gave the owners a large master-bedroom suite — the bathroom won Bathroom Designer of the Year — and a terrace facing the garden. And we relocated the kitchen to the centre of the house, and made large frameless openings to the garden. A television room is now located in the quietest corner of the house.

The existing arched loggia to the drawing room has been enclosed by a glass box, which forms a kind of winter garden, and signifies on the outside the modernism we have created inside.

The staircase I am particularly pleased with — it’s made of folded metal clad in oak, and cantilevers from a new curved wall. The walls throughout are polished plaster, and the doors are all full height and mounted on pivots, rather than hinges. And the new windows are all custom made stainless steel units.

We chose nearly all the furniture, and re-landscaped much of the garden, too.”