Fit for a family: Richard John Andrews and Kristina Ralph Andrews with baby Arlo
(Picture: Juliet Murphy)Redeveloping and restoring a dilapidated former house in multiple occupation in Newham into a flowing, innovatively multi-textured family home would be challenge enough for most people.
For architect Richard John Andrews and his make-up artist wife Kristina Ralph Andrews, however, it was a chance to create an idyllic east London retreat and put their design manifesto into practice.
The 1890s mid-terrace Victorian house — which the couple bought in 2015 in a dingy, dilapidated state — now serves as Richard’s remarkable flagship project, intended to show his clients how to banish run-of-the-mill mindsets via a palette of striking, versatile and sustainable materials – as well as a location for Kristina’s fashion magazine shoots.
“Our personal brief was that the home would be designed for now, but with an eye on the horizon,” says Richard, 36, whose architecture firm (richardjohnandrews.co.uk; @richardjohnandrews) dreamed up intriguing resi and commercial projects with names such as A Crooked Barn and A Flipped House. “I wanted to unlock the constricted terrace house layout that is typical of narrow London homes, while at the same time bring a holistic approach to the build. Another aim was to develop our careers alongside the evolution of the home, and make it the lead piece in my portfolio.”
Today, seven years after buying it for £375,000, the house is photoshoot ready thanks to a meticulously organised plan of phased works which allowed the couple to release equity from the house as they added space and made over interiors — pausing for the arrival of baby Arlo.
From squalid to splendid
Behind the blush pink front door, on Bristol Road in Forest Gate, the three-bedroom home has been transformed from a squalid, overcrowded bedsit into an experimental yet practical family home. It has a 12-metre square cork-clad rear extension and loft conversion, an ink-washed birch plywood kitchen, dyed concrete fireplace hearths poured in situ and a translucent polycarbonate-roofed architecture studio in the garden — dubbed The Light Shed.
“On the day we moved into the house there was a bed in every room, laminate flooring laid over the carpets and magnolia paint slathered over wallpaper,” Kristina, 33, recalls. “It was largely devoid of any decent internal features and the single, downstairs bathroom at the rear had been carved up into two cubicles with a strip light running across them. Plus, the house was infested with fleas.”
“It was truly horrible,” Richard says. “But the bones of the house were great. The London stock brick on the façade and the intact box bay windows were the real selling point.”
Setting a high standard
It wasn’t just their design values driving the project. Newham had long been known for its overcrowded properties, fuelled by high rents and a shortage of affordable homes. “The house had to set a high standard for small scale residential developments,” Richard says. “We wanted to start a conversation about the fact that good-quality building design needn’t be constrained by budget.”
With the support of a planning officer at the council, who helped get planning permission through in weeks, the couple went on to spend about £188,000 on the build and renovations, starting on the ground floor and working their way up.
To conserve funds they did much of the work themselves. Richard took 14 months out from his architecture practice, often labouring on site alone on groundworks steelwork, brickwork and roofing. “This presented some challenging design and construction obstacles, making tasks such as lifting timber a logistical problem-solving exercise,” he says. He even fitted the energy efficient home’s 11 cast iron-weighted sash windows, saving £20,000 by buying them on a supply-only contract from Poland.
Kristina helped rip out the rear of the house to make way for the extension, stripping back the original wooden floorboards to their original glory and staining them black — and discovering hidden talents along the way. “It turns out I am excellent at tiling and pointing brickwork,” laughs Kristina, whose artistry has been showcased in British Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, i-D and Dazed Digital (@kristinaralphandrews). “Working with a trowel isn’t a million miles from my day job.” She even crafted the mirror in the main bathroom out of inexpensive glass bought from Amazon, leftover roof flashing and a piece of MDF.
A bespoke home without the premium price tag
The family now has two ground-floor living rooms to choose from — one with blue-black walls, leather furniture and a private members’ club feel, the other lighter and brighter, with a jungle of indoor plants plus typographical artwork — and an airy master suite in the loft extension.
Their favourite family hangout, however, is the kitchen extension and the narrative it creates between outside and in. “It was crucial for us to maintain a strong connection between the home and garden, and have a real focus on spaces at the rear of the house,” Richard says. They clad the extension in compressed cork, choosing it for its sustainability and high insulation factor, as well as its aesthetic appeal — it weathers beautifully like brick.
The birch plywood kitchen was created from simple cutting lists supplied to local timber merchants, with the couple designing, fabricating and assembling all the cabinetry themselves, and staining it in toxin-free Indian ink. “As our budget was restricted in places, we wanted to create a bespoke kitchen without the premium price tag,” Richard says.
The addition of full-height sliding pocket doors, docked within a cork wall at the end of the kitchen space, provide unobstructed views of the garden and The Light Shed studio, which was built in 21 days by Richard and an assistant. It’s now decked out with birch plywood shelving and Made.com furniture.
Landscaping the south-facing garden into a series of outdoor rooms was the final chapter, completed last summer. With areas of gravelling, wildflower beds and L-shaped sofas, it effectively breaks the threshold between inside and out.
Richard’s practice has now outgrown The Light Shed and he has moved into a creative co-working space, Forest Gate Works (@forestgateworks). But the house and studio have more than served their purpose. “We like to think the hundreds of people that have passed through have been inspired,” Richard says. “We have seen an influx of high-quality housing projects in the area and believe we have played a part in that.”
He does, however, enjoy finding imperfections in the house. “It’s all part of being a fallible human being, with every flaw telling a tale. Every success and mistake make up the very personal journey of creating our home,” says Richard.
More design advice and inspiration can be found at the Homebuilding & Renovating Show (homebuildingshow.co.uk) in Surrey, June 25-26. For two free tickets visit surrey.homebuildingshow.co.uk/pr-estandard.
What it cost
Purchase price: £375,000 in December 2015
Ballpark figure for the build and renovation: £188,000
Budget breakdown
Ground floor extension and renovation: £100,000
A Light Shed: £12,000
Loft conversion: £70,000
Garden makeover: £6,000
Richard and Kristina’s top tips
- Do work in phases over time so you can fund it in stages
- Make the most of any good features in the building. The couple emphasised the London stock brick and bay windows
- DIY: Richard and Kristina saved money by project managing the renovation themselves and doing a lot of the building work
- Shop around for supplies: Richard saved £20,000 buying sash windows from Poland and fitting them himself
- Choose simple, sustainable and non-toxic materials such as cork and birch plywood for low-cost style that lasts
