GloucesterGate

Gloucester Gate is Grade I listed and forms part of a terrace designed by John Nash and built in c. 1827 on the north eastern side of Regents Park. The property is a single dwelling house (having been converted from flats in the 1980s) with four storeys, a lower ground floor, a closet wing extension, and a mews building behind.

 

The design brief for the project was to focus on the interconnecting spaces through the ground floor, and how this can be used to serve the owners’ main living requirements, while retaining the importance and character of the original Nash building.

 

The project addressed the lack of spatial continuity through the house by replacing the closet wing with the annex. The previous closet wing was poorly-composed and modified numerous times since its construction. The concept intended to give the new annex functional importance by connecting spaces vertically as well as laterally. The annex façade serves as an improved interface between inside and outside, and the bowed shape, a neoclassical reference to John Nash and his contemporaries, upgrades the space from a corridor into a central dining room. The shape has the benefit of allowing sunlight to flood the spacious interior of the new dining room. It also reveals the arcade of the mews house, improving the ability to appreciate its architectural value.

 

The waterstruck coal-fired brick is a modern interpretation of London stock-brick; an attempt to subtly distinguish between original and new. White in-situ concrete slabs emulate Regency-Georgian stucco architraves, window reveals and cornicing details. Portland stone flooring and English Oak sash windows further emphasize the idea of a new architecture that borrows elements and style from the past.