Episode Information Peckham: The Space Pod

Date Published:

11/06/2008

Here we see an extraordinary and inventive project in South London. This house proves that even in the most crowded areas of our cities, there is potential for Grand Designs.

When Monty Ravenscroft and Clare Loewe began looking for a house to buy in London they soon realised that the only affordable option was to build one themselves. They snapped up a dirt cheap slither of land in Peckham at an auction only to be told it was too small to put a house on. Undeterred, three years ago, engineering whiz Monty began building an extraordinary experimental bungalow that filled the site to bursting point.

Calling on friends, family and anyone he could think of to help, Monty started to put together a very space-age design complete with sliding glass roof light, mezzanine bedroom pods and a bath under the bed. He quickly ran into trouble with building control who didn't know what to make of his unorthodox home and when he and Clare found out they were expecting their first child midway through the build, they wondered if they'd ever get it finished. Now Kevin is back to find out how many gadgets and gizmos Monty has managed to squeeze into this modest home and whether it suits family life.

Finance

As Monty doesn't have a regular income and because this project is such an unconventional design no bank or mortgage company is prepared to lend him money . So Monty's taken a real gamble. He's borrowed the money from his dad who's remortgaging his own house. Once the build is complete he has to get a mortgage to pay him back - but there is no guarantee of that.

Design

After years of searching Monty found this scrap of land squeezed between two listed Georgian villas in South London. It's so tight no one thought you could put a house on it. But with a lot of creative thinking, Monty has devised a challenging, low cost design that fits snugly onto this awkward shaped plot.

With houses on both sides of the plot the planners will only allow a single storey building, which means there's nowhere to put the windows. So Monty's architect, Richard Paxton, has responded with two ingenious solutions that are both big architectural and big engineering features of this low cost, hi tech house...

The first is a huge sliding glass roof above the main open plan living space. Crucially it introduces light into the heart of the building and in summer creates Monty's open air Roman courtyard.

The second solution comes in the form of two space saving mezzanine pods that protrude from the roof to catch yet more light. They each just squeeze an upstairs bedroom under the single story height restriction and they're accessed by a space saving pigeon step staircase. These mezzanine pods, half attic, half dormer window should help provide critical additional space.

At the back of the house is a third master bedroom. It's the only wall where Monty and Claire can have windows so they're making the most of it with sliding glass panels. The planners have also dictated that the house has to be hidden from the street so the front is screened by a row of planted willow stakes.