Home Extension and Refurbishment

This home extension and refurbishment project, in the village of Yarnfield in Staffordshire, involved transforming an existing residential property, a former farmhouse, into a sustainable family home for our client, who is a paraplegic wheelchair user, and his family.

Whilst the property had undergone a multitude of historic alterations and extensions, it still retained several heritage assets that my client wanted to preserve, including some pargeting.  Both the ground floor and first floor were set across multiple levels, with a change of level between most rooms, which is not conducive with accessible living.  We were tasked with considering options to make the property fully accessible.

Following inspections of the existing footings, which were at various depths, we established that the existing ground floor could be completely taken up and replaced with a new insulated and more importantly, level floor throughout.

This would also have a positive impact on the thermal efficiency of the building.  In addition to this we were to install wood fibre external wall insulation to the existing property. The existing rooftiles were to be removed to allow installation of insulation between and over the existing rafters, thus improving the entire thermal envelope of the building and enable the replacement of the existing oil fired boiler with an Air Source Heat Pump.

Some existing elements of the building were structurally unsound, and we proposed the demolition to make way for new extensions that would house a large double height kitchen and another extension that would house our clients ground floor bedroom and accessible bathroom.

A wide access cloister that extended the length of the home, seamlessly connected the individual spaces, allowing for ease of access and maneuverability for our client and his family.  The proposal was also designed to future proof for my client’s worsening health in order that it could meet their needs now and in the future.