Manor House Stables were once home to “Lovely Cottage”, a celebrated race horse and winner of the Grand National, the United Kingdom’s largest horse race. Lovely Cottage won the last Grand National on Friday, April 5, 1946. After the race he returned home to the stables for a celebrated rest. Time marched on and eventually the stables were forgotten, abandoned and began to fall apart.
The interior of the stables before
Fortunately the history of Manor House Stables was not forgotten. The property was transformed into an elegant contemporary three bedroom family home by AR Design Studio in 2013. Architect Andy Ramus saw potential in the dilapidated stables and remembered their history. The vision to create a contemporary family home within a historic stable in the picturesque Hampshire countryside was brought to life.
The stable’s past and history put design constraints and restrictions on the project for AR Design Studio. They wanted to preserve the existing structure and keep new additions simple, letting the original character shine. The existing exposed timber interior walls were kept in place and provided a challenge for the layout. The walls were cleaned, stripped back, and refurbished to reveal the exposed timber interior walls.
AR Design Studio believes design constraints and restrictions can often create the most interesting solutions. The concept was to preserve the existing while making any new additions simple and pure in order to let the original character shine. The layout had to revolve around the old stable doors.
Once the existing internal walls were brought back to life, the next challenge was to turn the stables into a home for a modern family. A contemporary and neutral approach was taken for the rest of the renovation, allowing the timber walls to stand out as pieces of art.
Many of the existing features were refurbished and re-purposed for use in the home environment; the original horse troughs were cleaned and converted for use as sink basins, the old horse ties act as towel rings in the bathrooms and original doors are preserved where possible to give a sense of real period character.
Modern design meets rustic accents in the bathroom.
The kitchen.
The welcoming and spacious open-plan kitchen is conveniently located at the heart of the home, leading into the light and roomy lounge with full height glazed doors that open out onto the sleepy village setting.
The entire property is insulated. Heated polished concrete floor throughout provides a functional uniformity to the spaces and preserves the stable’s history. New windows and roof lights fitted throughout give the whole place a warm, bright and clean feel; creating an excellent environment as a backdrop for a family home.
AR Design Studio is a RIBA certified architects practice, based in Winchester, Hampshire, specialising in the delivery of elegant and imaginative contemporary new homes, extensions, renovations and mulit-plot developments.
Photography by Martin Gardner
Want to see another amazing old horse barn conversion? Check out this stable that was turned into a guest house.
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