Old Shed New House in Great Ouseburn, North Yorkshire, Redevelopment, Architecture, Architects News
Old Shed New House in Great Ouseburn, North Yorkshire
Architectural Development in north England, UK – design by Tonkin Liu
6 Jan 2020
Old Shed New House
Design: Tonkin Liu
Location: Great Ouseburn, North Yorkshire, England, UK

Old Shed New House is a home nestled within the agricultural landscape of North Yorkshire. The client sought a high quality, energy-efficient and low-cost building to serve as a house, library and gallery.

An existing agricultural shed on the site ? once a container for tools and tractors ? is now a container for a lifetime collection of books and art. The steel frame and ground slab have been reused and enlarged, retaining the original form of the shed. Newly clad in varied widths of shot-blasted timber and galvanised steel fins, the rhythmic facade reads like the bark of the silver birch that characterise the site.
The surrounding landscape is pulled into the building?s two principle double-height volumes through large axial openings. A long gallery, orientated east-west with the site?s long tree-lined approach, draws visitors in from afar and frames the rising and setting sun from within. A tall south-facing library, bounded by mirror-backed shelving and a light-modulating canopy, evokes a forest clearing in the heart of the house.

The house is a journey of interconnected spaces that alternate between the grand and the intimate. The spacio...