Sea Change

The Island, Cornwall

Seventy feet above the crashing waves, you walk along a swaying footbridge. You step onto a wild granite rock overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by luxuriant vegetation. There you will find The Island, unreachable by land, replete with history and folklore. You may have heard stories about its past: the former chicken and potato patch, the séances held there by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Our approach to this unique house was one of reverence. For more than a century, The Island’s distinctive red roof has been a landmark of the Cornish coastline, familiar to fishermen and surfers, tourists and painters. Our challenge was to leave the building’s iconic silhouette untouched, but to modernise and expand its interior. A modest bungalow, its bedrooms faced inland, turning away from the ocean, and the weather. Seeing as we could not build outward, we moved up, extending into the valley of the roof and doubling the floorplan. The building’s original arch motif is repeated throughout, the former front door refashioned into a picture frame window.

The sea informed our choices at every step. Rather than battling the house’s surroundings, we took inspiration from them, creating a dialogue between the interior and what lay outside. Moody blues and warm timbers formed the basis of our colour palette; using marine-grade materials, we turned the bedrooms outwards, facing the harbour and the ocean. The sun fuels ten solar panels; rain is harvested to irrigate the garden. A small tower above the roofline echoes the Huer’s Hut across the bay, a historical lookout for shoals of pilchards.

Will Gamble came up with a great design for our house on The Island. It was a challenging project, as we wanted to maintain the public view of a highly visible landmark. Will found a way to achieve this whilst making major changes to the inside and adapting the less visible external faces.
The design was a collaborative process where Will listened carefully to our aims. He was ideal for our project, which needed creative thinking to maintain the essence of an existing building, whilst incorporating new elements. We are delighted with the results.

Client