Hampshire

Built in 1912 by Inigo Triggs and William Unsworth for the traveller, explorer, naturalist, artist and editor Aubyn Trevor-Battye. The house is south facing and Arts and Crafts in style and was designed to a specific brief that sought to maximise light and ensure the fullest views of outside from every angle when seated anywhere inside. Its design was heavily influenced by Trevor-Battye’s Mediteranean travels – yellow stucco, a red tiled roof, balconies, Moorish arches and towers as well as Unsworth’s interest in the architecture of the past.

Set amidst four and a half acres of landscaped woodland gently spreading out on the banks of a little valley with a stream running through it, the gardens were designed by Triggs.who was also heavily influenced by the gardens Of Generalife near the Alhambra in Spain and Italian gardens. French windows look out onto a grass walk some 100 yards long at the end of which stone paving leads down to the bog garden and stream or towards a sunken garden and pond and fig garden.

The project saw the extensive refurbishment of the historic interiors of the building, This included the removal of a number of insensitive interventions made in the 1950s and 60s when the house was last redecorated and the original bathrooms and kitchen replaced. We removed these later additions and set about uncovering the bones of this beautiful house to form a backdrop for relaxed family life surrounded by a selection of carefully curated antiques and art.

A fresh but muted colour palette and minimal window treatments allow a full appreciation of the elegant and generous proportions of the rooms and the garden and surrounding countryside.

The updated interior is intended to feel at once homely and ‘inevitable’ and in keeping with the house. The star of the show is without doubt and always will be the building itself and the garden around it.