A Triumph of Teamwork

Wednesday 20 January 2021 PLUMP UP THE VOLUME Bring some zing to your next Zoom with a ruffled cushion: Page 17 ven the most passionate renovator might be put off by water-logged flooring, hair-encrusted paintwork and a mould-flecked Emortuary-stark bathroom. But for young husband-and-wife architect team Madeleine Ike and Jonty Hallett, they were simply minor details in what they knew instantly was their dream project. “We had been looking for a long time for just the right flat, but after an endless parade of soulless places, this one immediately struck the right chord,” says Ike, 32, of the one-bedroom garden apartment. “The place needed so much love and care, but because of our architectural and design backgrounds, we could look straight past the years of accumulated grime and shoddy repair jobs to see the potential. The Victorian proportions and scale were still grand, and the private garden was A triumph of an added benefit.” LESS IS MORE Today, six years after that first teamwork viewing, the transformation of the Endymion Road flat which edges Finsbury Park is complete. Less a A husband-and-wife renovation than a transfiguration, it’s a masterclass in the reimagining of a architect duo tell Emma Wells neglected period home into a soothing urban oasis. how they created an urban oasis Against a harmonious backdrop of pale wall colours and flooring, stained Douglas fir joinery, a rear extension clad in English larch and bespoke metal furniture designed by the couple are focal points amid Hallett and Ike’s unswerving devotion to minimalism and the calming power of uncluttered spaces. Having spent about £470,000 buying the flat, Hallett says they carried out only cosmetic tweaks during their first four years of ownership, saving up to do the major works while focusing on the 2018 launch of their London-based architecture and interior design studio, studiohallettike.co.uk. Continued on Page 16 Cut! Ford wraps up his mega-ranch director Priciest street is made in Chelsea average sells 20,000-acre home after £19m price drop house is £36.6m on UK’s most expensive road FASHION designer and filmmaker Tom Ford, designed a modern glass and A STREET in Chelsea which has been home Mouseprice. The two next most expensive inset, has found a buyer for his jaw-dropping concrete house at the ranch, with to stars ranging from Madonna and Jeffrey streets were Campden Hill Place (average ranch in New Mexico — after a £19 million minimalist living spaces Archer to Hollywood actor Douglas price £20.8 million) and Ilchester Place price cut and nearly five years on the market. overlooking pools of water. Fairbanks Jr has been named as the most (£15.8 million), both in Holland Park. The Cerro Pelon ranch spans 20,662 acres — Listed for £55.2 million expensive road of the past decade. The only London roads outside the west more than 28 times the City of London — and ($75 million) in 2016, the estate Between 2011 and 2020, the average sold in the top 10 were Courtenay Avenue includes an entire fictional town, built for the was later reduced to £36 million price on The Boltons in SW10 was (£15.1 million), in Highgate, and Whitestone 1985 western Silverado and also used in 2011 ($48 million) although the final £36.6 million, making it the priciest street in Lane (£14.4 million) in Hampstead. Marvel film Thor. Architect Tadao Ando sale price remains undisclosed. the UK, according to property data website ⬤ Read more at homesandproperty.co.uk 16 WEDNESDAY 20 JANUARY 2021 EVENING STANDARD Homes Property | My home Continued from Page 15 Bold new look: Madeleine Ike and FIRST STEPS Jonty Hallett “We actually did very little at first,” stripped their flat says Hallett, also 32. “Simply stripping to its Victorian back the dark, painted wooden bones before flooring, removing peeling wallpaper adding more and painting the walls white.” Just contemporary enough, he says, to eradicate traces of touches such as recent owners’ bodged DIY jobs, Serge Mouille’s while laying bare the beauty of the black steel, brass living room’s exquisite Victorian and aluminium cornicing and fireplace. pendant Used to working on high-end residential schemes for moneyed clients, Hallett admits sticking to a budget for their own home was challenging. “Our aspirations for the spaces often far outweighed what we could afford,” Hallett laughs. “So knowing when to pull back was key.” Working to a budget of about £70,000, the pair set about turning their vision into reality with the bespoke, canopied Corten-steel front door, replacing the former humdrum entranceway, setting the tone for a design one-off. The intriguing rear extension — which gave the flat a total interior living space of 894sq ft — is the pair’s pièce de résistance. The flat only had one living space and one bedroom, so the couple were keen to create further entertaining and guest zones. They transformed the cramped galley kitchen to incorporate a light-flooded dining space, with durable Douglas fir the key material, used as the main joinery and on bench seating and window surrounds. A playful feline-shaped cutout in one GET THE LOOK of the benches serves as a hidey-hole for their cat, Architects: Studio Hallett Ike room, by Serge Mouille: Lunar, with stainless steel (studiohallettike.co.uk) (en.smallable.com) work surfaces adding an Brushed steel kitchen White Forties pendant light industrial feel. A floor-to- worktop and blackened steel in dining room by Jorn ceiling door leads on to the shelf designed by Studio Utzon: (andtradition.com) garden, which they found as Hallett Ike: Sunbeam Group Aluminium-framed a muddy expanse of (sunbeamgroup.co.uk) dining room door: Velfac moss-infiltrated grass and Bathroom and kitchen tiles: (velfac.co.uk ) have since coaxed into Solus Ceramics Skylights: Roof Maker an exotic plant and (solusceramics.com) (roof-maker.co.uk) fern-filled haven. Bathroom fittings: Mini glo-ball wall light: Flos Crosswater (crosswater.co.uk) (flos.com) SEASONAL TOUCHES Matt black KV1 kitchen tap: Cornforth White paint on The added second Vola (en.vola.com) living room walls and Ikea’s bedroom/home office is Kabric hybrid paint/plaster Ivar pine cabinet: Farrow & clad in hand-charred larch, in living room and bedroom: Ball (farrow-ball.com) which changes colour with Detale CPH (detalecph.com) Black metal triangle floor the weather and seasons — Blanco engineered timber lamp: HK Living (hkliving.nl) Open spaces: display ceramics or as side tables. Jonty’s own canvases are abstract sometimes silvery, boards in dining room: Artwork: The Poster Club the couple added prints from the Poster Club, propped sometimes warmer-hued. Havwoods (havwoods.com) (theposterclub.com) a rear extension, DESIGN HEROES against walls in good-quality frames. “We were out there with a Black steel, brass and Plants: Paramount Plants above, to create a Their bespoke creations are Despite having only recently blow-torch, getting the aluminium pendant in living (paramountplants.co.uk) 895sq ft living interspersed with judiciously chosen completed the project, the couple effect just right,” says Ike. “If space. Minimalist pieces that link their own contemporary have decided to sell up and have put we had simply painted it or designs make the work to that of their Fifties design the flat on the market for £749,950 stained it, the grain wouldn’t have space feel bigger heroes. In the living room, Serge (mrandmrsclarke.com). They are stood out so beautifully.” This Mouille’s dramatic triple-arm black planning another renovation project obsession with texture, nature and steel, brass and aluminium pendant in central Oxford, where they can craftsmanship is a constant refrain hangs from the ceiling and in the afford to buy a larger home. Lucky, throughout the entire home, seen main bedroom sits a grey Eames then, that they work so well together. also in Hallett and Ike’s choice of Plastic Armchair on rockers. Ike says: “I am an incredibly practical terrazzo in the kitchen and shower But look closely and you’ll also find person, having spent a lot of time on — “Marble or stone with strong crafty high street finds — all part of construction sites, whereas Jonty is all veining would have been too the duo’s thrifty sense of knowing about the craftsmanship and always overwhelming a look,” says Ike — where to splurge and where to save. remembering that the devil is in the and in the neutral grey hybrid In the living room, Ikea’s Ivar pine detail. It’s a pretty good combination.” paint-plaster on the walls in both the cabinet makes for handy extra main bedroom and the living room, storage. “We spent part of the last from Danish firm Detale CPH. lockdown doing some Ikea hacks, Both Hallett and Ike say the living actually,” says Ike. “We sanded the Thinking of room is their favourite space, with its unit back and painted it in Cornforth original, elegant features, touches of White, which totally transformed it.” moving? Start Farrow & Ball’s understated grey Clever renovation budgeting, she Cornforth White on the architraves, says, is knowing what big ideas will your search on and their own specially designed require considerable investment — furniture. Largely constructed from such as structural work — and the black steel that showcases the natural Photographs “minimal moves” that don’t always patina of use over time, classic pieces by Michael need a big spend — like furniture and include a coffee table and storage Franke and artwork. A powerful way of tying units, as well as lightweight, spaces together is by using similar fuss-free terrazzo plinths, used to Ståle Eriksen palettes and art.

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