House of the Year contender: this quirky guest house and artist's studio hovers just above Essex marshland
Hovering ever-so-slightly above Essex marshland on steel poles, painted red like the legs of the wading bird that is its namesake, is Redshank - one of this year's RIBA House of the Year nominees.
The unique one-bedroom construction, built from cross-laminated-timber (CLT) and clad in cork, was commissioned by a married couple, two artists, who had bought a timber-framed run-down beach house.
The idea was to replace it with a box that sits more than two metres off the ground - to protect the building from flooding as well as to reinstate the marshland below.
They came to architect Lisa Snell with a sketch of what they wanted - an outline they had already received planning permission for.
Snell's role was to make the dream a reality. The result is a beautifully clever 48 square-metre artists-studio/guesthouse within walking distance of the family home.
The project took two years to complete in total, as building work had to stop over the winter.
Snell says: ”The build was pretty slow and torturous, but it gave us time to consider things - it wasn't necessarily a bad thing."
The interior is made up of three rooms - the living room, bedroom and bathroom. There are windows on each side of the building, to maximise the views.
“You can see the sunrise and the sunset, it's just stunning really,” says Snell. “Inside the exposed CLT absorbs the light so it's very gentle even when the light is pouring in.”
Cork is a fairly untested material used in this way but it has weathered surprisingly well since the building was completed last April.
A bonus is that it has also proved to be pretty much self-cleaning, especially as there are integral bird boxes on the underside.
"Marcus was very willing to push his neck out and take some risks, so he relieved some pressure by setting that brief," says Snell.
Completed last April, Redshank now sits quite gently in the landscape as the colour of the cork has faded. So, too, has the English oak used for the decking.
"It really doesn't feel like it stands out,” says Snell. “People literally walk under the house.”
