Kent, United Kingdom

Acme applied the Kent landscape with its apple orchards and oast houses used to dry hops as part of the brewing process to design this new 300m2 house as a 21st-Century interpretation of the formal language of Kentish architecture.

For their project called “Bumpers Oast,” five towers are built slightly apart from each other, creating inward-looking spaces in each tower and a more outward-looking central space opening out into the surrounding apple orchard.

Each of the towers houses private functions such as bathrooms, bedrooms, and service spaces, and framed window openings allow for selective views out.

The center of the house is a triple-height living space, visually open to the garden and towards each of the four towers, forming the heart of the house.

Oast houses are traditionally made from solid brick walls with clay-shingled roofs.

In order to achieve an extremely low-energy house, the towers will be built in two layers—a heavily insulated inner skin and a clay tile rain-screen façade.

The outer skin is made from traditional Kent-style tiles in six shades, slowly fading from dark red at the base to light orange at the tip.

The interior of the roundels unfolds seamlessly into one another.

The entry floor is grounded in hard finishes, that transition to warmer materials as one climbs the towers into the more intimate living, play, and sleeping spaces.

Project: Bumpers Oast
Architects: Acme
Design Team: Alia Centofanti, Nicholas Channon, Deena Fakhro, Catherine Hennessy, Katrina Hollis, Kevin Leung, Friedrich Ludewig, Lucy Moroney, Heidrun Schuhmann, and Penny Sperbund
Consultants: Furness Green Partnership, Ten Architecture & Design, Wilkionson Construction Consultants, and Etude
Planning Consultants: Barton Willmore
General Contractor: Harry Barnes Construction Ltd.
Client: Private
Photographers: Jim Stephenson