How we turned a tired 1960s house into a stylish modern home

Although there are no rules concerning the location of exceptional houses, finding them on busy main roads is relatively unusual. But this house, on the border of Hackney and Haringey in north London, roundly defies the expected. 

From the outside, it is a classic Sixties build, complete with a concrete path leading to the front door. “It’s a good shape, like a child’s drawing of a house,” remarks its owner, Graeme Bulcraig, “so we played on that. We kept the chimney, for instance, even though it doesn’t do anything.” 

Inside is a different story. A tight palette of materials (including ash, microcement and clay plaster), generously and thoughtfully applied, create the feeling of being enveloped by the space. Then there is the layout of the ground floor, which has a kitchen “pod” at the centre clad in Richlite, a type of compressed recycled paper. “Putting the kitchen in the middle of the house is quite controversial for some people, but I didn’t want it at the rear, stealing all the best light,” says Bulcraig. “This way, it creates a connection between the dining room and the sitting room.” More on this later.

Bulcraig bought the house in late 2020 after separating from his wife. He had lived in Stoke Newington for 20 years and knew he wanted to stay nearby, but he also wanted a project: a difficult thing to find in this part of London. When this property became available, he jumped on it: “It was a complete find, a blank canvas,” he says. Previously rented by students, it was in a poor state, but he gamely moved in while searching for an architect. 

While he had some specific requests, including increasing the floor space by at least 50 per cent and adding a rear roof conversion, his brief was otherwise an invitation to create something unique. “He was up for a project, that was the main message,” says Nimi Attanayake, director and co-founder of Nimtim Architects, the firm Bulcraig chose to commission. “I liked their positive, can-do attitude, the warmth and sense of play,” she says. “They are innovative and quirky, but also realistic – no one was about to suggest a slide instead of stairs.” 

Nevertheless, a venture of this sort demands a certain degree of confidence. “You have to hold your nerve,” cautions Bulcraig. “I work with images [he runs a photographic retouching and digital imaging business called Touch Digital], so I know what will look good and what won’t.”

Bulcraig also has form, having previously worked with the architect Lucy Marston (a winner of Grand Designs Home of the Year) on the extension and renovation of an old mill in Suffolk, which he used as a holiday home, and with the designer Philippe Malouin on the offices of Touch Digital. 

He is deeply interested in design and architecture, and wanted to create a home that was unique to him, for which he was prepared to research every component of its design, from the oven and the taps to the light fittings and the bathroom tiles: “it’s almost the best bit,” he enthuses. 

To explore how Bulcraig would like to live in the house, Attanayake began with what she calls “the briefing game”, in which different coloured counters (pink for activities, green for objects and yellow for qualities) were moved around the existing and potential floor plans. The resulting three proposals that she came up with all offered flexible separation: rooms that could be divided or connected using partitions. 

“There has been a significant move away from big open-plan spaces recently,” she notes. “Most of our clients now are still looking for a sense of openness, but with a bit more definition and articulation of the different functions of the space. It’s interesting to reflect on how technology has changed the way we live in a remarkably short period of time. 

“For a lot of households, we are now designing for scenarios where each person is using their personal electronic device and therefore requires their own ‘niche’ within a larger space with other people in it,” says Attanayake.

In the option Bulcraig chose, the house is bisected by a “spine” of screens made from Siberian birch ply and glass, which separate the sitting room from the hall at the front, and in the new extension at the rear, the dining area from the sunroom. The screens, which let light flow between different areas, comprise panels of glass, fluted glass and ply, in an appealing, irregular pattern.

The fluted glass has also been used in the kitchen, where it can close the cooking area off from the sitting room. The structure of the pod itself also divides and connects, being both open to the spaces on either side, yet also offering a degree of privacy – you can’t actually see the kitchen unless you lean into the hatches. 

Although the pod feels like a new concept, Fiona Ginnett, co-founder and director of HØLTE, the kitchen company responsible for it, points out: “A version of it has existed since the Sixties.” The Richlite cladding, a material Ginnett had long wanted to use, gives the pod a strong identity, but also warmth and softness – and although she hadn’t worked on a pod like this one before, she now has several in the pipeline.

HØLTE specialises in bespoke kitchens using carcasses from IKEA or Howdens, which it customises with its own range of worktops and handmade fronts. This has obvious budgetary benefits, but Bulcraig was also drawn to its collaborative approach and emphasis on sustainability. He caused quite a stir by bringing a Lego model of his imagined kitchen into the studio, having previously built a model of the ground floor to explain his ideas to Attanayake.

Bulcraig loves to cook and had strong opinions on storage and functionality. He also knew where he wanted things (the hob, for instance, facing the dining space) and what he wanted, which included a coffee machine and a pull-out larder. “There was a lot to fit in,” says Ginnett, “and we wanted it to be quite special, different and unusual.” Bulcraig had initially specified Crittall and concrete for the kitchen, but Attanayake says: “We persuaded him to use more organic materials with notes of burgundy and soft pinks, which we felt were more suited to a family home, and he really ran with it.”

The burgundy and pinks continue upstairs, where Attanayake enlarged the main bedroom and converted the loft to create two bedrooms, a shower room and a den for Bulcraig’s children. He now also shares the house with his partner Neeltje, an economist. When the house was in the planning stage, their relationship was in its infancy, but Bulcraig says they bounced ideas around, and the house, in turn, has begun to influence them both. “Burgundy has become our favourite colour,” he says. “Neeltje has started buying burgundy clothes, so she sort of blends into the environment.” 

With the exception of the curved sofa in the living room, which came from Heal’s, the furniture is a mishmash of their existing stuff. “It’s not really considered, or properly thought through, but it works for us,” says Bulcraig. “We’ll change it in time.”

Like most people who undertake building work of this scale (or indeed any scale), Bulcraig went over budget. He planned to spend £300,000, but the total cost was £450,000. “I ended up redoing the front door, using the fancy taps and the razzy hob extractor. But I knew once it was finished I would never redo things, so it made sense to do it once and do it well.”

On the face of it, this is a radical house, but as Attanayake says, “It’s not radical for Bulcraig,” but rather an authentic response to his particular way of living. No grandstanding, just good sense.