Victorian villa with star quality

Press profile homify Press profile homify
Astor House, NRAP Architects NRAP Architects Moderne huizen
Loading admin actions …

Refurbishing, renovating, or adding a rear extension: none of these are an easy undertaking. Moreover, ensuring that the update is timeless, stylish, and liveable, can be an extremely tricky task. Luckily for the owners of Astor House, a simple late-Victorian villa, they entrusted their restoration and overhaul to NRAP Architects. This home was extended in the ‘80s, with a garage, office, and garden room to the rear of the property. The brief was simple yet crucial: update their home and bring it into the 21st century. The couple wished to retain the character and charm of the original rooms in the front of the house and upstairs, while the rear would have the garden room rebuilt, with a new kitchen, living, dining, and stairwell area. The home had to accommodate the couple’s children and grandchildren, as well as providing liveable, and light-filled spaces. With countless new fittings and fixtures, the architects and designers have created a space of immense superiority, utilising the highest quality materials. 

Take a peek inside this brilliantly renovated home, and glimpse the striking abundance of first-class features, sleek spaces, and a thoroughly graceful domestic interior design.

Expansive entertaining

Astor House is a brilliant example of stylish architecture at its finest. From the rear view of the home, we see the new extension that has replaced the old ‘80s addition. The new construction is contemporary, timeless, and brings this home into the 21st century. Included in this refurbishment, is a new rear wall, this is styled to match the existing home, and creates a seamlessness between the old and the new. This house is an entertainer, gorgeously designed to maximise space for family gatherings, shindigs and soirées. The simplicity and style of this space ensures it is recessive, but still acts as a striking feature to the space.

Bringing the outside ‘inside’

A spectacularly open and liveable space—this interior oozes sophistication, as well as a sense of easiness and contemporary refinement. The outside is brought ‘inside’ with the use of concertina glass bi-fold doors, which work to ensure the interior and exterior seamlessly intermingle. The tray-vaulted ceiling features a cut out design with a recessed space for lighting. This ensures the illumination is subtle and elegant. As well as performing as a stylish attribute to the space, it guarantees an undemanding mood for the room, and increases the feeling of spaciousness and buoyancy.

A sleek dining experience

For a truly luxurious dining experience, this space is a standout, in terms of design and construction. Perfectly located near the living space and kitchen, this eating area is located within the new ground floor refurbishment, and offers the owners a place to entertain their guests with ease and comfort. The light and bright white colour scheme imparts a cleanliness and the sandstone tiles keep the area easy to clean, and hardwearing for a large amount of foot traffic. The space is decorated with a glass table and matching chairs that add to the chic modernity of the space, and the whimsical white curtains add a sense of light airiness and cheer.

The recessive staircase

This staircase not only provides a brilliant way to ascend to the next level of this house, but also combines the old with the new effortlessly and stylishly. Incorporating a contemporary aesthetic, this stairwell is in itself a piece of furniture. It is extremely unimposing on the home, and evokes a sense of modernity as well as simplicity. The panels of white-stained birch ply keep the area bright and the smart inclusion of a new internal ‘window’ brings extra, illumination into the originally dark area of the corridor. As the architects have stated, ‘It is used to make sense of the newly opened up ground floor, sitting as a fulcrum between the kitchen and the living room, keeping these two spaces apart.’ To give this staircase a hint of heritage, and a touch of tradition, the runner carpet is added to soften the space.

Smart storage

Throughout this home, we see a wonderful use of space, and this is further enhanced with the built in joinery, shown here in the form of bookshelves. These bookshelves act recessively with the rest of the home, and inject a sense of organisation, liveability, and usability. Moreover, they create a feature of the white wall, and offer the occupants an eye-catching space in what would be a plain and simple space.

One final look

As we take one final look into this stylishly appointed, and brilliantly designed space, you cannot help but feel a little envious of the occupants. This home has it all—a wonderful cohesion is present in the entire refurbishment and extension, and imparts a sense of modernity, as well as graceful sophistication. Upon closer inspection of the rear addition, the use of large bi-fold doors ensures the space shares a connection with the outdoors, and because of this, exudes a natural energy and vivacity.

If you would like some more home inspiration, check out our other ideabook: Illuminating a forgotten gem in London

Hulp nodig bij uw woonproject?
Neem contact met ons op!

Hoogtepunten uit ons magazine